


Your Trigger Finger's Mine

by ArisuShanti



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Agent Keith (Voltron), Agent Lance (Voltron), Alternate Universe - Military, Alternate Universe - Spies & Secret Agents, Bisexual Lance (Voltron), Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Enemies to Lovers, Eventual Smut, French Speaking Lance (Voltron), Gay Keith (Voltron), Japanese Speaking Keith (Voltron), M/M, Mutual Pining, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Rating May Change, Slow Burn, Slow Burn Keith/Lance (Voltron), Sniper Lance (Voltron), Spy Lance (Voltron), Spy!AU, my attempt at slow burn tbh
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-01
Updated: 2018-12-30
Packaged: 2019-03-25 08:01:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 17
Words: 67,198
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13829913
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArisuShanti/pseuds/ArisuShanti
Summary: Being a spy is tough work, Special Agent Lance McClain can assure you of that.Blood, guns, drugs, car chases, explosions. He had to deal with the shit on a daily basis, it came in the job description. He would like to think that he had prepared himself for anything. Until one day he found out he was so very, very wrong.He hadn't prepared for one thing, and it came in the form of Special Agent Keith Kogane.Their mission: Don't fuck up. Don't die. And most importantly, don't fall in love.





	1. Ready or Not

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rivals clash, new mission is revealed, envy creeps in and so does the sexual tension.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> somehow this is my first voltron fanfic, which is surprising considering how much i love the show. so here you go, my first writing piece in a while, let alone my first fanfic in a while feat. my favourite au

Lance let out quick breaths of air as he ran through the buildings. His lungs began to burn from running for so long, legs weighing him down and his arms feeling like concrete attached to his shoulders.

Lance glanced at either side of him, searching for that trace of red beyond the long stretch of rooves surrounding him. All he had to do was spot that quick flash of colour, and he'd be on it. He narrowed his eyes, giving a quick look behind him. Nothing.

He hopped over one of the barriers that was in front of him, and swiftly ducked under an overhanging pole. Lance had been running for what felt like 15 minutes already at top speed, and he hadn't spotted anything yet. His target only had about a 30 second head start, they couldn't have possibly ran that far. Lance slowed down to a light sprint, so he could think better.

"Hey, check your six." A crackly voice spoke into his ear through the comm-link. Lance flinched minimally at the sudden sound, but quickly regained himself and followed their instructions without a word. As he reached the end of the rooftop he was on, he stepped off the edge and grabbed one of the bars sticking out, swinging himself onto it and through the window of the building under him.

"I'm down," He spoke into the mic. In this short time, he was able to catch his breath and finally gather up his surroundings. He seemed to be inside a pitch black office, paper and glass riddled the floor caused by his abrupt makeshift entrance into the building. The sun had already set, but the sky behind him still had a hue of orange to it, giving the room a bit of an afterglow.

Lance shook his head, and brought his guard up again. His target was tricky, he knew from past experiences. And if you let them get the jump on you, you might end up dead. Lance reached to the sniper rifle on his back and brought it out into his hands. This may have been a bit of a bad choice of weaponry for this situation, but he couldn't swap it out now. He ducked down and moved through the darkness in complete silence, listening for any movement.

"Blue, one of my the motion sensors was set off!" His teammate spoke into his ear, he could hear the nervousness and edge in their tone. "They're two rooms down from you right now!"

"Got it!" Lance answered, and shut off the comm, making a break out the door and down the hall. Depite the fact that he was running, his footsteps were still almost completely silent. Almost.

Lance's grip tightened on his gun, and he stopped in front of the room where his target was supposed to be in. With a deep breath, he kicked down the door and ran straight in, preparing himself for whatever was going to come out at him. To his surprise, nothing came out to stab him in the neck. He stopped in confusion and looked around, holding his scope close to his eye to get ready for any attacks. He tapped a button on the side of his earpiece and spoke into it.

"Hey, buddy? There isn't anyone here?" Lance questioned, kicking over a chair inside the room. It was still relatively dark, but there weren't any real places you could hide in here.

"Uh, they should be there, the sensor was only triggered once when they entered," He responded, sounding just as confused. "They would have set if off a second time if they left."

"Well, he's not here so-!" Lance threw his arms up in the air, and felt his hand hit something that definitely was not a wall. He instinctively ducked into a roll, just in time for a dagger to narrowly miss his head. He let out a huff, blowing a strand of hair out of his face.

"Never assume the target doesn't have the jump on you, Blue." Lance's attacker dropped to the ground from his hiding spot. Lance whipped around with a frown, coming face to face with a man masked in a red mask.

"Where were you?!" He pointed his rifle at his head, Lance's finger having a steady hold on the trigger. The masked man pointed above his head, scoffing. Lance spared a quick glance to the ceiling above, noticing a rope hanging down from a hole above the persons head. Cheeky bastard, that's cheating.

"Looks like I got you this time, Red." Lance began to put more distance between them, taking slow steps backwards, his sight still pointed right at his head. He knew better from all the times facing him that you should never let him get close to you. His specialty was hand-to-hand combat. "Hands up, weapons down."

In the dim light, he could see Red roll his eyes and put his hands up reluctantly. Lance felt a grin of victory tug at his lips, as he watched his main rival surrender in front of him. He quickly forced it down and kept a stone cold expression for his opponent in front of him. He can't show any emotions right now. Lance noticed he still had a knife in hand, and couldn't help but frown.

" _Weapons down,_ " He commanded, this time with more edge to his voice. Red hesitated for a moment, thinking. He finally surrendered, and slowly bent down to put his knife to the ground. Just as he was about to set it down, he suddenly surged forward, throwing something to the ground at his feet.

"What the-!" Lance jumped back, narrowly avoiding getting tackled to the ground. Red ran right past him, and Lance watched in confusion as he jumped out the window. Wait, why would he jump out the window?

A familiar faint ticking reached his ears, and Lance looked down realizing what Red had done. As fast as he could, Lance bolted towards the broken window and jumped out of it, just as a bomb set off and blew up the whole room. The blast radius launched Lance forward, and he hastily pressed a button on his wrist. A grappling hook shot out of it like a Spider-Man web, and latched to the side of the nearest building. He let out a groan of pain, as he collided right into the brick wall of the building he was attached to. Lance blinked the spots out of his eyes, and looked around to spot Red.

He was nowhere in sight, and Lance groaned, smacking his head against the wall. He flicked the side of his headset to get it working again, and Hunk's voice immediately registered in.

"Lance, what happened?!" Yellow gasped in relief to hear his teammate was alive. Lance groaned again.

"Bomb," He answered simply with a sigh. "Lost sight of target."

"Wait, wait, hang on..." Hunk tapped at his keyboard rapidly and gasped. "Found him!"

Lance straightened up, "Where?!"

_"Directly ahead! 100 meters!"_

Lance looked up and no doubt, there he was sprinting towards the goal point with his stupid mullet blowing in the wind behind him. He instantly started to scramble to climb up his grappling hook with Red in his sight, but it suddenly detached itself from the side of the building and Lance fell to the concrete ground with a thud.

"Shit!" He cursed as he landed flat on his back, rubbing his head. He just fell from almost two stories high. This was the worst mission ever.

 _"Target's getting away! 100m to the extraction point!"_ Hunk yelled, his voice becoming strained. Lance groaned and slowly got to his feet. In his dizzy state, he spotted Red again and saw him approaching the goal very quickly.

"Dude, I'm on the ground! How the hell am I supposed to get up there and take him down in time?!" Lance huffed, looking around to find a way to get up there fast, when he spotted his sniper rifle laying on the ground in front of him. A lightbulb went off in his head.

"Hunk, I got an idea!" He looked to the screen on his wrist and selected his boosters, typing some numbers into them.

 _"No! The jet boosters are still a prototype! You're going to get yourself killed!"_  Hunk yelled into the mic.  _"50m to exit point!"_

"Have you ever heard of style points?" Lance chuckled, grabbing his rifle off the ground and getting it ready in his hands.

_"40m!"_

"Okay, I got this." He drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly.

_"30m!"_

"Shit, I'm going to die, aren't I?"

_"20m!"_

"Here goes nothing!" Lance adjusted his stance and angle, and without another word he slammed the button on his wrist and the boosters instantly fired up, shooting him into the air and above the buildings.

_"10m!"_

As he was shot into the air, Lance brought the scope of his gun up to his eye. Through it, he saw Red was merely a single second away from reaching the end, his hand outstretched to grab the small container in front of him. If his whole career didn't count on this one shot, he would have stopped to admire the view a bit. Sun setting, complete view of the horizon and even beyond it. It was quite liberating.

_"5m!"_

He shook himself out of his momentary daze at the sound of Hunk's voice. With a deep breath, Lance quickly moved the sight to line up just ahead of Red's stupid masked face and without any hesitation, he pulled the trigger. A sickening boom echoed throughout the buildings as Lance's bullet cut through the air and connected with Red's helmet, just as his fingertip grazed the container.

_"Oh my god."_

Lance fell again for the third time that mission, but at least this time he had the sense to duck into a roll and he landed semi-gracefully onto a roof. He huffed and within an instant, shot up to check if the bullet connected. Lance caught sight of Red with a splatter of his very own signature colour smeared all over the side of his helmet, the glowing blue container clutched in his gloved hands.  He let out a sigh of relief and pumped a fist into the air, barely restraining the loud  _'whoop'_ of victory from leaving his lips. Finally! He won against stupid Red, his longtime rival since they entered the academy. Lance glanced over to him and watched as he slowly pulled his helmet off, running a hand through his sweat soaked hair. Sometimes, Lance wondered if the man was even aware of how frustratingly attractive he could be at times. Red ripped off the mask from his face and dropped it to the floor next to his helmet, and Lance couldn't stop the words that came out of his mouth.

"Hah! Take that, you stupid mullet-head!" He pointed a finger directly at his face from the roof he was standing atop. 

 _What the hell am I saying? ,_ Lance thought as he jumped down to his level and walked straight up to him. Red said nothing as Lance began to approach him, and for some reason that just made him even more fired up.

"How does defeat taste, Keith?" Lance bounded up in front of him, his rifle slung over his shoulders. Keith rolled his eyes and let out a long sigh.

"Congratulations, Lance. You did it."He said, not looking up as he cleaned one of his knives, acknowledging the fact that he most likely won, especially with a shot like that. The words were nice to hear, but it was totally obvious that his tone was sarcastic. Lance didn't care and decided to take what he could get from him.

"Hell yeah, I did!" He started to do a little victory dance. "You just got  _owned!"_

_"Ahuh."_

"Did you see that shot?"

"I was on the receiving end of it. So, yes." He huffed in annoyance, obviously not wanting to admit that it was impressive. Lance opened his mouth to gloat more, but he was cut off by a voice over the speaker systems.

 _"I don't mean to rain on your parade, but you're mistaken Lance."_ Allura said with a tinge of pity in her voice. All around them the sky above faded into black and the normal lights came on, lighting up the giant dome they were in. Lance looked up at the corner of the dome, and suddenly a glass box that wasn't originally there popped into view. Inside the box was Allura, their spymaster; and Shiro, their team captain. Allura leaned forward toward the mic and her smooth voice echoed throughout the training grounds.

 _"Actually, Keith grabbed the container a millisecond before you shot him.."_ She trailed off and looked away. Lance's face dropped and he turned to Keith, who had already slid down the ladder and was out the door. Before he left, he noticed his shoulders were shaking a bit and his hand was over his mouth.  _The bastard was laughing at him_.

"What?! Check again!" He shouted up at them, which was unnecessary since they had mics throughout the whole grounds. Shiro gave him a rueful shrug through the large window and turned to walk out the door as well. Lance groaned and hung his head down, sliding down the ladder to meet the rest of his teammates.

When he pushed the doors open to the main lobby, there was a whole crowd of people surrounding one person. Lance already knew exactly who they were there for and attempted to wiggle his way around the group of excited soldiers. He caught some of the things they were saying and grimaced.  _"Wow, Keith!", "You're the best field agent in the whole ring!", "Can you spar with me later?"_ Lance wanted to shoot all of them dirty looks, but there were too many that by the end of it, his eyes would have fallen out of his skull. How come no one was acknowledging him? Did everyone just become completely blind for those two seconds where he was a complete badass? Keith didn't even do anything special, he just threw a bomb and ran.

When he was in the middle of the crowd, he caught sight of the man himself, looking very uncomfortable as one of the female soldiers draped herself over him. Their eyes met, and for a moment Keith had a look on his face that screamed  _help_ , before it melted back into his usual aloof expression. Lance hesitated for a moment, wondering if he should go rescue him. Honestly, even if he hadn't called for help, Lance would have saved him anyway. For some reason the sight of girls and boys alike gawking at him made Lance's stomach turn. He opened his mouth to call to him, but Shiro beat him to it.

"Recruits! Get back to your stations!" The man spoke with his scary authoritative tone. He hadn't even raised his voice, yet the sound boomed throughout the stuffed common room over all the mingling voices. Nearly everyone in the crowd flinched and began to scramble toward the exit, not before giving him a salute. Shiro was the most decorated soldier in the ring, and no one dared to defy his authority. Well, second most decorated next to Allura. 

As if on cue, the woman herself walked into view and the soldiers shoved each other away to make a path for her. She gave some of them a gentle smile and every single one of her targets flushed a deep red. Lance couldn't blame them though, she was the definition of a super model: tall and gorgeous. Except she was probably deadlier than a regular super model. Just one big murderous angel.

"Well fought, the two of you!" Allura applauded. "And what a lovely shot, Lance."

The compliment had him soaring, and he restrained himself from letting out the goofy smile that tugged at the corner of his lips. Keith filed up next to him, and saluted her. Lance followed in suit. She chuckled, and waved a hand to dismiss them. The two stood down and shot each other a side glance, and Lance momentarily took in the image of his teammate beside him. His sweaty hair stuck to his forehead and his mullet sticking out in funny places. The small drop of sweat that slid all the way down his face to the pale curve of his neck. That intense gaze trained directly at him, arms crossed over his chest, flexing the defined muscles of his biceps. He swallowed, his adams apple bobbing. Keith blinked at him, and Lance suddenly realized he was staring at him with a face that probably looked like a glare. He quickly whipped his head around and thankfully, Pidge and Hunk rounded the corner. At the sight of his close friends, Lance's signature grin returned.

"Lance, oh my god!" Hunk cried, and suddenly Lance was lifted off his feet. "That shot was so awesome!"

He smirked, "Oh, you think? Well, that was a pretty normal occurrence, you know." He heard Keith scoff from behind him, and chose to ignore it. Hunk set him down on the ground gently.

"At least we know that our rocket booster prototype works well," Pidge added. "And smart move with the grenade, Keith."

He nodded in response, "Any mission updates, Shiro?" 

The man stood up straight and gestured to Allura. The rest of the team fell into line as Allura gave them a rundown on what new assignments were available. Most of them were just small intelligence gathering missions that were to be assigned to some of the lower ranking recruits. As it looked like she was beginning to end their brief, her face dropped into a serious expression and she lowered her voice.

"There is one last assignment I have yet to tell you all." She started out, letting her gaze linger on Lance and Keith. "It's about that worldwide mafia group."

Hunk's eyebrows shot up, "Do you mean the Galra?" he asked incredulously. Allura nodded grimly. 

"Pidge has come upon some new information that they are throwing a gala." She paused, waiting for the information to sink in. "Some of the most dangerous gangs in history are going to be there."

Shiro continued, "This is going to be a long mission and we need two of you to go." 

Lance and Keith simultaneously stepped forward, "Let me go!" The two yelled in unison. Their heads snapped up and they turned to glare at each other. Shiro and Allura glanced between the two, then gave each other a knowing look.

"Okay, Keith and Lance, you two will be taking this assignment on." Allura agreed, and added. " _Together._ "

"Are you sure about that, guys?" Pidge held a hand up, asking. Hunk nodded profusely.

"Not that we're doubting your authority or anything!" He quickly interjected. "It's just that... Lance and Keith aren't really on the same wavelength."

"Yeah, I agree!" Both boys shouted in unison again. This time they both looked partially baffled at their in time yells. 

Shiro chuckled, "They seem pretty in sync to me. Plus, this is a hands on assignment and I don't think Pidge and you would be suited for the job."

"We will go into more detail tomorrow morning, first light." Allura cut off the discussion." For now, get some rest, team." 

The four of them saluted at their commanding officers and dispersed. Everyone else had walked off in the direction of their own rooms, whereas Keith and Lance headed off towards the showers. The two walked side by side in awkward, and for some reason, intense silence. It took everything in Lance to not glance at Keith again. He was afraid that if he looked into his eyes again, then Keith would be able to read his mind and the thoughts he had about him right now. Lance couldn't help it, he might hate the man, but he wasn't  _blind._ Before he realized, the two had already reached the door to the showers. He stepped aside and opened the door, motioning for Keith to enter first and he did.

The tense silence continued on, even as they undressed and stepped into the shared showers. Of course with his luck, the whole room was empty so it would be just the two of them. Butt naked. Thankfully, Keith chose the shower on the opposite side, facing away from him. At least Lance wouldn't be tempted to take a peak at him, given their distance. As quickly as he could, he tried to finish up scrubbing his body clean of all the dirt and sweat that had accumulated during their training session together.

He looked down at his body and let his fingers ghost all the thin and faded scars that riddled his body, letting the hot water wash over him. With a light touch, he pressed his fingers to a bruise that had started to form on his side from all the times he fell, and let out a hiss of pain. He could sense Keith flinch at the sound he made, and ignored him. Lance could bet that he also had some nasty bruises on his back, but decided he was too lazy and scared to check. Scared of accidentally getting a sneak peek of Keith's body. Keith's body that was currently devoid of clothes. Keith's body that was completely stark naked behind him, and all he had to do was simply turn around to get a view of that nice juicy as-. 

Lance slapped himself in the face hard. When did he all of a sudden turn into a horny teenager? He was 23 years old, for god's sake! He needed to get a hold of himself, it's just a shared shower, it's not that big of a deal. He's been in service ever since he was a teenager, he should be used to this kind of thing before. He has seen plenty of dude's asses and dicks, some willingly, most not. He could handle himself. Just don't turn around-

"Hey, er, do you have any shampoo?" Keith cleared his throat from behind him. _What the fuck, Keith, why do you make me suffer?_ Lance thought as he became painfully aware of the fact that his voice sounded much closer than it should have been. He forced himself to respond.

"Uh, yeah dude, here." He meant for his voice to sound clear and controlled, but it ended up coming out more choked and squeaky. He cursed himself silently and turned around slightly to hand him the required bottle. Lance suddenly came face to face with a wet-haired Keith standing directly in front of him, and his eyes were looking down at-  _Dear Lord, please no._ Keith flinched and his eyes shot up to meet Lance's. For a second they just stared at each other, processing how incredibly terrible and awkward this was, both of their faces becoming increasingly redder. Lance shoved the bottle into his hands and instantly rushed out of the showers, nearly slipping on the way out.

As soon as he was out of Keith's sight, he collapsed onto a bench in the locker rooms. He couldn't believe what had just happened. Was Keith, his main rival, his arch-nemesis, his forever opponent, checking him ou-? No, impossible. Lance quickly rid that thought from his mind, and grabbed a towel to dry off so he could get dressed. He was probably just looking at the floor, and Lance was mistaken. He shook his head, and pulled his clothes over his head, leaving the cursed room. 

Lance got into bed and stared up at the ceiling blankly. Today was the most interesting day he's ever had, and it was going to get even more interesting from now on. Him and Keith were partners, whether they liked it or not. He had no idea how long they would be undercover, but he assumed it was going to be a long time. A long time spent with just him and Keith. Him and Keith. Lance and Keith. Keith and Lance. Partners. Together. 

Lance had no idea why, but for some reason he liked the ring that had to it. That was the last thought he had before fatigue overtook him and he fell into a dreamless sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> potentially more to come! depending on how many people like it. i really hope people like this, because i love writing Spy/Army AU's. leave a comment and kudos if you enjoyed the first chapter <3
> 
> follow me on [tumblr](http://arisushanti.tumblr.com/) and [instagram](https://www.instagram.com/arisushxnti/) !
> 
> i made an inspo playlist based off this fic, you can listen to it on spotify [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/omgitsreynaa/playlist/4VUPrPU9xlMItnQUQCNF0F?si=qyDRQd9jTXOY-WpPiZBAhQ)


	2. Bonding With a Punch

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bonding attempts are made, secret missions are explained and sparring ensues.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> half of this was written in my tech design class, so enjoy.

Lance woke to the sound of incessant knocking on his door. When he glanced outside his window, the sun had barely started to peak over the horizon. He groaned and rolled over to check the time on his clock. _5:00am_ _._ Who the hell was waking him up at this hour? He knew that Shiro did say 'first light', but this was ridiculous. Reluctantly, Lance rolled out of bed in his blue shark-print pajama's and swung the door open. He was prepared to hold his tongue upon seeing his commanding officer standing in front of him, but instead he was met with the worst possible thing he could encounter on a Tuesday morning. 

"Uh, hi." Keith greeted him, sounding a bit startled. Most likely at how fast Lance got up. It was made pretty clear that he was not an early bird. 

"Hi?" Lance returned the greeting with a bit more confusion. Why was Keith at his door? At 5 in the morning? As if reading his mind, he responded.

"Shiro asked me to get you." He explained with a shrug. "Something about, _'getting in some bonding time'."_

"Right..." Lance nodded his head, hesitantly. Keith simply stared back at him with almost a little glare, and Lance felt very uncomfortable all of a sudden. "Uh, I'm going to get changed into my uniform."

Keith blinked and looked him up and down, as if he just realized he was standing there in pajamas. There was a little flicker of amusement in his eyes as he took in the sight of the pattern of little cartoon sharks. Lance began to blush. Now he knows that he's a loser, great. Well, what's new about that? Keith took a small step back without breaking eye contact, arms behind his back and Lance slowly closed the door to get changed. Man, that dude acted so weird when he wasn't being emo or angry at him. But again, what's new about that?

After ten minutes of primping and preening, he walked out the door again, this time with brushed hair; brushed teeth; and his uniform looking clean on him. Lance expected Keith to have already left, but to his surprise the man was leaning against the wall in front of him, eyes closed and arms crossed over his chest. He looked almost as if he was sleeping. Lance cleared his throat to get his attention, and Keith slowly opened his eyes. He quickly surveyed his appearance to see if he was presentable with a small frown. It looks like Lance passed his test, because after a couple of seconds he was already walking down the hall. Without another word, Lance followed.

"Where are we going?" he asked once he caught up with Keith. His eyes flickered towards him, before he answered plainly.

"Briefing room." He replied in a monotone voice.

"What about breakfast?" he asked, frowning, already feeling his stomach rumbling. 

Keith huffed, "I think you can wait 20 minutes." Lance's frown deepened. 

They continued the rest of the walk in silence. This seemed to be a normal occurrence with the two of them. Share awkward prolonged eye contact, talk for two seconds then proceed in even more awkward silence. He had to fix that issue.

"Keith, Lance, come in please." Shiro called out to them from inside the briefing room and Allura waved them inside. The two stepped into the dimly lit room. The compound was dead silent and it added to the overall mystery of the situation. Keith shut the door behind them, locking it. The loud click of the lock rang in Lance's ears and he suddenly became aware of the setting he was in. It would have been a fairly spacious place, if not for the giant metal table that took up most of the area. He could barely make out the solid metal walls underneath all the maps and diagrams that were hung all over the room. A single light dangled in the middle of the ceiling, lining up perfectly with the table that was underneath it, papers and files strewn across it. There were no windows to be seen, and if there were he wouldn't know, considering the makeshift wallpaper made out of notes tacked to the wall. This was the first time Lance had been in there, and he wanted to take it all in. 

"Sorry to call you both in this early," Allura apologized. Even at the most ungodly hour, she looked absolutely stunning and radiant. Who needed the sun, when you had her?

Keith shook his head. "It's fine, Allura..we're glad to be here." Lance noticed the way he hesitated before he said 'we'. He was planning on adding some snide comment that went something along the lines of, _"Hey speak for yourself! My beauty sleep is crucial to my performance!"_ , but decided otherwise. He simply nodded in agreement, for once not saying a word.

"Then let's get started. Allura?" Shiro turned to her and she pressed a button on the projector that Lance hadn't noticed had been there. A partially blurry picture of a man with long silver hair tied back in a ponytail lit up the wall on the opposite side of the room. Lance and Keith moved to stand on either side of Allura and Shiro, respectively. 

"This is our main target Lotor, code name: The Prince," Allura started off. "He is the son of Zarkon."

Lance nearly spit out his metaphorical drink. "Zarkon?! As in the leader of the Galra? Someone was willing to bang that crusty dude?"

Shiro coughed in an attempt to suppress the small chuckle that bubbled in his throat. "Yes, that is right. And there have been multiple sightings of him in Japan, mostly the Tokyo and Kobe area."

"Why?" Keith asked suddenly. Allura pressed another button on the projector and it changed to a more focused picture of Lotor. His recognizable slick back ponytail was still worn, the man looked no older that 30. He sported a completely black suit with the only colour on his clothes coming from a simple deep purple tie. Very mafia-like. 

"Business. With his father in a coma, he has risen to temporarily fill in the role as the leader of the group." Allura replied. Lance had almost forgot about the Galra until yesterday. Ever since Team Voltron barely pulled of that raid against them, they left Zarkon completely incapacitated. Since then, activity from the Galra ceased. After months of peace, it looks like they were up and running again, this time with a young and handsome man as their head. Wait, did Lance just call a Galra handsome? He was losing his mind. Most likely from the lack of action he was getting. 

"What business?" Keith questioned further. "Information? Supplies?" 

"Guns." Shiro answered and pressed another button, changing the picture. This time it was of Lotor entering a mysterious building. The windows were painted black and there was no address. "He's been seen frequenting the supposed headquarters of the Ebony Dragons. A Japanese gang specializing in high-tech weaponry development."

"What kind of weapons are they making specifically?" Lance jumped in before Keith could steal his question. Shiro shook his head.

"Let's hope you guys put a stop to it before we find out for ourselves," He responded grimly. Keith and Lance turned to look at each other from across the table, then looked back at Shiro and Allura, blinking blankly.

"What do you mean,  _'you guys'_ _?"_ Keith asked hesitantly, afraid of the answer. Lance nodded in agreement. This time it was Shiro and Allura's turn to look at each other. He watched their faces closely, noticing how Shiro's eyebrow twitched upward, indicating that he wanted Allura to speak. She let out a small sigh and gave in.

"Well, you both are going to infiltrate the Galra and take down the whole deal," Allura said, as if it was obvious. Lance's face dropped. This was his first official espionage mission, why was he getting the most important job? Oh, god.

 _"What?!"_ They yelled simultaneously, this seemed to be another trend with the two of them. Keith's eyes were blown wide, and his hands were gripping the edge of the table, his knuckles turning white with tension. Lance's reaction was fairly similar. Within Keith's hard gaze, he noticed a small tinge of pride and joy. He assumed it was because he was honored to be trusted with this mission. 

"Why do you think we're doing this at this time? In this place? This is top secret and very crucial to the downfall of the Galra." Shiro's voice was low and serious, causing a shiver to run down his spine. Thoughts and questions flew through his mind, but there was only one that kept repeating itself.  _Why him?_ Instead of blurting out nonsense or freaking out, he bit his tongue and held his head high. He was going to prove his worth.

"Continue, sir." He vocalized with a clear and steady voice. Keith stared at him almost incredulously, probably at how unfazed he seemed by the situation. Which was completely false, he was terrified. Allura cleared her throat and went on.

"Your mission is to travel to Japan, infiltrate the gala, gather information on the location of the blueprints and weapons themselves, then destroy them all." She explained, pressing another button. A map came up with red circles around certain areas. "These are some locations where we suspect that the weapons are being held." 

Lance didn't recognize a single one of the town names or building names that were circled. Probably because they were in hiragana and he didn't speak a lick of Japanese. As soon as that thought crossed his mind, he understood why they wanted Keith and Lance together on the mission.

Keith was an expert on Asian languages (not simply because he was Asian, it just happened to work out that way) and he was fluent in Korean, Japanese, Cantonese, Mandarin, Filipino and much more. He also did recon work in Japan for about two years while Lance was still in training. Lance on the other hand was more familiar with European languages, but the main reason they needed him was because he excelled at reading people. Their facial expressions, body language, vocal cues, their way of speech. Keith may have been one of their best fighters, but he was bad with people (the only thing he was good at that involved people was killing them). This wasn't about getting into a brawl. This was about getting in, destroying the weapons, then getting out without getting noticed or killed. 

"You want me to manipulate someone into giving me the information and you need Keith to translate everything." He blurted out, finally connecting the dots. Shiro smiled at him, pride evident in his eyes. "And if we get into trouble, Keith being specialized in close combat will be useful, versus my long range sniping skills that would be hard to utilize."

"That is exactly it. Good job, Lance." He nodded. Lance took the opportunity to take in Keith's surprised and flattered expression, which simply consisted of his eyebrows being more raised than normal. Even if he had to compliment him to get that out of him, he still enjoyed it. Keith let out a little huff, and went back to his usual arms crossed over his chest position, a little frown dancing on his lips.

For the next two hours, Allura and Shiro explained to them exactly what was going to happen and how they expected them to carry it out. Basically they would be going to the gala as the leader and leader's translator/bodyguard of a well heard of, but not well-known French mafia group. The "mafia group" was actually a fake gang that was made a long time ago to disguise their agents that were doing undercover work in France. They were given the schedule and all the details that were needed to go through with the mission. After the briefing, Lance checked the clock and noticed it was already time for breakfast. The two agents were dismissed with a final salute, and they both headed down to the cafeteria together.

Lance prepared himself for the awkward silence that was to come, but was surprised when Keith spoke up. "How did you know?" he asked.

Lance looked up at him, and tilted his head in confusion. "How did I know what?" 

"How did you know what the mission was going to be about?" Keith sighed and diverted his gaze away from him. Lance guessed he was embarrassed that he was asking him about something he didn't understand. For someone who was initially stone-cold, he was surprisingly easy to read.

Lance chuckled, at the thought. "I figured that our fighting skills would be useless for an undercover mission, so I assumed they needed us for our  _other_ skills."

"Oh." He said simply. Ah, there it was, finally. The awkward silence that proceeded every interaction they had. They  _really_ had to work on that. Normally, Lance was amazing at keeping a conversation going, but something about Keith was so off-putting that he couldn't do it. 

When they reached the cafeteria, they went their separate ways without a word. Lance going to sit with Pidge and Hunk, and Keith going to his usual empty table in the corner. The only difference now, was the whole time he could feel Keith's fiery stare piercing the back of his head. Keith pretended he wasn't doing anything and Lance pretended not to notice.

"So?" Pidge cleared her throat, pushing her glasses up to rest comfortably on her nose. Lance blinked out of his trance and turned to her. She repeated the question.  _  
"So?"_

"So, what?" She rolled her eyes at his obliviousness. 

"How did the briefing go?" She asked, shoving a forkful of bacon in her mouth. Hunk nodded in agreement.

"What are you doing? Where are you going? Are you really going to be working with  _you know who?"_ He threw all the questions at him, frantically. Pidge slapped him on the shoulder, shooting him a tiny glare.

"He's not Voldemort!" She sighed in exasperation. Hunk rubbed his shoulder with a frown.

"Well, sorry that that man is terrifying!" He exclaimed, then lowered his voice into a loud whisper. "He's like the devil, he appears when you say his name!"

"That's such bullshit, here watch." Pidge cracked her knuckles, and with the most silent voice Lance has ever heard from her, she whispered  _'Keith'._ They looked at each other, then around the room. He was nowhere in sight. 

"See, buddy? Keith is not-" Lance continued, but was interrupted by a food tray being set down at the spot next to him. All three of them flinched and Hunk let out a terrified shriek.

They watched in partial horror and surprise as god damn  _Keith Kogane_ settled himself down in the seat next to Lance, and started eating his cheerios in silence. The trio stared at Keith, not believing what they were seeing. Ever since Lance has known Keith, he has never made an attempt to make any social interactions with anyone, let alone have breakfast at their table. Lance examined his face carefully to see if he was being forced into this. He saw no signs of reluctance or hesitance on his features, instead some serenity and anxiousness. Slowly, Keith finally raised his head to look at them all. Immediately, Pidge closed Hunk's agape mouth and the two went back to eating their food, a tense silence filling the air. Lance was seriously getting sick of these moments.

"Hey, man, what's up?" He asked, turning to Keith beside him. The man seemed shocked that he was talking to him, judging by the slight widening of his eyes, before they settled back into a neutral expression again. He muttered something under his breath that Lance couldn't hear, causing him to tilt his head in confusion. Keith sighed, as if he didn't want to say it again and turned away.

"The...sky..." He repeated in a slightly more discernible mumble. Lance blinked at him. Did he seriously just say 'the sky'? That was something you'd say when you were in middle school talking to your little 7th grade crush. Oh my god, was he 12? What the hell? That was so...

"Cute." Lance uttered. Keith flinched and stared up at him, a faint flush of rose tinting his cheeks. What was wrong? What did he say? Wait, did he say that last part out loud? Oh, god no. 

"Did you just call Keith cute?" Hunk shook his head in disbelief. Lance looked up and finally noticed they were both staring at him, utensils dropped onto their plates and jaws wide open. Shit.

"What? N-No!" He stuttered out, trying to hide the flush that was slowly creeping onto him. "You misunderstood!"

"Then what did you mean to say?" Keith asked, a hint of hopefulness in his eyes. God damn it, don't give him that look now! Now he was definitely looking cute!

"You know what, never mind!" He huffed, attempting to steer the conversation another way. Pidge wasn't done just yet though. She adjusted her glasses on her face again, the lenses glinting menacingly.

"Oh?~" Pidge purred and winked at Lance. "So  _that's_ why you two are being put on a mission together!"

"What?" He choked on a piece of waffle that he was in the middle of swallowing. "What are you implying?"

She continued to wink aggressively. Well, as aggressive as winking could be. "You and Kogane over there, huh?"

"I don't get it," Keith stated, a look of innocence and curiosity painted all over his face. Lance resisted the urge to face palm at both of them. Why him? Why was he the one stuck in this situation? If only Lance had held his tongue, then he could have avoided being on Pidge's hitlist for teasing. Well, what difference would it make? He was always on Pidge's hitlist (for both teasing  _and_ killing).

"It's nothing!" He urged and hastily grabbed Keith's arm, dragging him away from the scheming Pidge. "We're off to go train and do other stuff now!"

Lance ushered Keith out of the cafeteria, but not before Pidge called out one last thing. "Oh,  _'do other stuff now',_ huh?~" Lance could feel her winking even more. He glared at her over his shoulder and she just started cackling. Hunk moved in to probably tell her to stop drawing so much attention to them, but that just made her laugh even more.

"Shut up!" He yelled at her, and stomped out of the room, Keith following behind him. Damn it, Pidge! Why does she always have to make things complicated. The real question was, what was he doing? That's all he was wondering at the moment. He stopped and turned towards Keith.

"Let's spar," He said more as a statement than a question. That familiar competitive fire lit up in Keith's eyes, and he nodded.

"Okay, sure." That was the one thing that they could do without the other resisting. Sparring.

The two made their way to the locker room to change into their uniforms they wore for combat training. It consisted of some form of cargo pants that was usually camouflage and a black shirt. At least this time, Lance didn't feel the need to worry about Keith's changing figure beside him, he was too focused on how he was going to beat him. 

Lance has never won in hand-to-hand combat against him. To be fair though, no one else has but Shiro and Allura. Except he wasn't just someone else, he was Lance McClain. The best sharpshooter in the whole compound. That was one thing he had going for him, he could at least consistently beat Keith in a shoot out. The only problem was that the man was starting to improve in his accuracy and was catching up to Lance at an alarmingly quick rate. The other day, Keith had almost won against him, if it hadn't been for Lance having to use his special jump-shot move. That was a no bueno for him. 

Keith nudged him in the side roughly, signalling he was done. Lance quickly pulled his navy blue shirt over his head and headed out with him, letting him take the lead this time. Lance took this opportunity to check out what his opponent was wearing. Only to look for any weak points, of course. He was wearing similar camo pants as him, and had on a plain black tank top. His hair was tied back into a short ponytail and his bangs were moved out of his face with a red bandanna that he used as a headband. His usual typical outfit, but looking at him made his heart thump a little harder. Probably from the adrenaline that was building up in the pit of his stomach.

They went into one of the empty training rooms and took their places in the middle of the room. Lance moved into a fighting stance, feet slightly apart and fists held up in front of him. Keith mirrored his stance, but his feet were a bit closer together and his weight was mostly on the balls of his feet. Odd. Lance decided to ignore it, and prepared for him to make a move. They circled each other, neither breaking eye contact nor focus. He had to look alive for this, Keith's specialty was going in unexpectedly and fast. He just had to wait for tha-

Lance couldn't finish his thought as Keith suddenly surged forward, a fist aimed towards his face. He stumbled back a bit, dodging the attack while blocking the second fist that flew towards his stomach. For a moment he lost his footing, instantly planting his back foot to steady him, but Keith wasn't letting him go that easy. Noticing his temporary off-balance stance, Keith did a 360 spinning hook kick heading towards his face and this time Lance barely managed to dodge it, getting nicked in the shoulder. He fell onto his back with a thud. Keith was really going hard with him today. 

The man huffed and backed up, letting Lance get to his feet again. Thankful for the mini break, he got up, but instantly regretted it as Keith surged forward again. Lance noticed a twitch in his left cheek as another punch was thrown towards the right side of his face. He dodged it easily this time and managed to grab onto his wrist, taking the opportunity to land a solid punch on his jaw. Keith barely flinched and used his other hand to grab Lance's arm, swinging around him to hold it behind his back. Lance stepped forward to loosen the pressure on his arm against his back and spun on the ball of his foot to send a spinning roundhouse kick. Keith let go of his arm and used his forearm to block the impact. 

The boys looked at each other for a moment, and Lance saw the burning anger and passion in his eyes. It made him shiver. Keith shook out his arm to relieve the pain of blocking that heavy kick earlier and adjusted his jaw with the other. Both of them were covered by a thin layer of sweat and Lance's breath was already starting to pick up. 

For once, Lance threw the first punch this time and Keith blocked it smoothly, putting in a counterattack of his own. The right side of his face twitched and suddenly a punch towards the left side of his face came flying at him. Lance ducked out of the way. He noticed something. Keith's  _tell._ Everyone had some sort of tell on when they were going to attack or if there were any past injuries on them. Similar with lying, Lance always looked for that tell. With Keith he could never find it and always looked at his body to see if he could catch it. It was on his face all along. Now Lance felt stupid, since his whole specialty was analyzing other's facial expressions. 

As if on cue, his nose crinkled a bit and his lips pursed minimally. Then, there was a double kick directed towards his gut. Even if he knew where Keith was going to aim for, it was still difficult to block. He held his forearm in front of him and took the impact of the two blows, accidentally stumbling again. Without wasting any time, Keith had him pinned to the ground and winded his arm back to punch him in the face. Lance panicked.

"No, stop! Not the face!" He yelled frantically, holding his arms up in front of him in an X. Keith's fist stopped a mere inch from his arm and he slowly retracted it. Lance sighed in relief as Keith got off of him and held out a hand to help him up. Reluctantly, he accepted it and was hauled up. Looks like he lost again, which was partially expected. At least he got to sneak in a punch. He considered telling Keith about his _tell_ , but all of a sudden he punched him in the gut. It wasn't as hard as he could go, but it still was enough to knock the wind out of him. Lance doubled over and clutched his stomach. He was definitely not telling him.

"What the fuck, dude?!" He wheezed out and attempted to straighten himself again, anger seething through him. Keith huffed out a breath that could almost be classified as a laugh.

"That was for punching  _me_ in the face," he scoffed and began to walk away. Lance glared at the back of his head, but made no moves to hit him back. He had a fair point since Keith could have went through with the punch and bruise his face, but he didn't. That was one thing he could thank him for. Lance watched Keith's retreating form and that thump in his heart came back. It pounded loudly through the blood rushing in his ears and the throbbing in his stomach. Keith shut the door behind him, and Lance assumed he was going to train by himself now, this little fight being just a warmup. He plopped to the ground, and laid on his back, staring up at the black ceiling. 

In one day, he was going to be on a plane to Japan with that man by his side. He recalled that the mission was probably going to go on for about 4 weeks based on the intel they received. Almost a month alone with just his main rival to accompany him. 

 _"Rival..."_ He mumbled. That word felt wrong on his lips now. Any time that was before today he would utter that word with little doubt about it. Now, something was not right about calling the two of them that. The only reason he dubbed Keith as his rival was because of how inconsiderate and arrogant he was towards him when he first joined Team Voltron, which was about a little over a year ago. Over the past couple of months though, that attitude he had towards him lessened. Maybe he knew that he was going to be assigned to him on a mission. Or maybe he realized how much of an ass he was being and decided to change his ways. Either way, that term was lost on him. 

 _Partners,_ a voice in his head said to him. Yeah, partners. That sounded better. He guessed he should start calling him that in his head from now on. Partners. The memory of yesterday came into his mind, after that exchange in the showers and Lance flushed a bit again. 

 _"Partners..."_ He trailed off, and slowly got up from the ground. For now, he decided he should just worry about the upcoming mission and how he was supposed to carry it out. Lance put the thought away, and walked out of the training room.

He walked down the hall to grab a drink from the water fountain, when he spotted a flash of movement in the room next to him. He stopped for a moment and gazed inside to momentarily watch whoever was in it. It was Keith. And in his hand was a gun. He watched Keith as he set up a tall staircase-like structure and climbed on top of it. He gripped the pistol in his hand and leaped off of it, taking a shot in mid-air at the dummy that was now under him. He had missed the mark by a long shot and Lance watched as he cursed to himself silently, once he landed on his feet behind the target. 

Lance wanted to laugh right then and there. He was practicing Lance's signature jump-shot. Keith Kogane was taking what Lance McClain had done and was trying to replicate it. He chuckled a bit, thinking of the slim chance that Keith looked up to him for that. It was impossible, but Lance could dream. He shook his head and continued on his way. 

_Partners, huh?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fuckin'. i should have planned this shit AFTER i finished season 5. now lotor is chill. what am i supposed to do now? also, tell me how y'all felt about season 5 because BITCH IM FUCKING DEAD! I LOVE LOTOR!
> 
> follow me on [tumblr](http://arisushanti.tumblr.com/) and [instagram](https://www.instagram.com/arisushxnti/) !
> 
> also i made an inspo playlist based off this fic, you can listen to it on spotify [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/omgitsreynaa/playlist/4VUPrPU9xlMItnQUQCNF0F?si=qyDRQd9jTXOY-WpPiZBAhQ)


	3. Off We Go

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> preparations and foreshadow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> short chapter because i am bad with time management and needed to get something out quickly. 4th chapter will be much more action packed, i swear to you guys. it should come out within the next few days or so, you can hold me to that.

This time, Lance woke to the sound of his alarm clock. The loud consistent beeping bringing him out of his sleep induced drowsiness. Slowly and surely, he rose from his bed and swung his legs over the side. He glanced to check what time it was.  _6:00am._ That was a bit better. He slipped his feet into some blue slippers that sat next to his bed and made his way to his bathroom. Today was the day he would leave for his big assignment, and he would be lying if he said he wasn't nervous. Doubts swam through his mind as he trudged to get changed.  _What if he gets caught? What if he can't do it? What if he messes up?_ He shook his head. Getting all nervous won't help him. After brushing his teeth he began to dig through his drawers to see if he had any casual clothes left to wear. Shiro said to the specifically that they had to wear normal clothing when in Japan, because they needed to look like tourists. You can't do an infiltration mission in black spandex and night vision goggles. 

He had just pulled off his shirt when suddenly a loud, impatient knocking rapped at his door. Lance sighed, and went to go open it, not caring that he was shirtless and whoever was out there would see him too. He swung open the door, and there stood the only person it could have possibly been. Keith. He opened his mouth to say something, but closed it shut when his eyes drifted downwards.

"What do you want?" Lance grumbled. He was seriously sick of Keith always showing up at his door to bother him. Keith frowned at the words.

"Don't blame me, I'm the one being forced to do this!" He hissed, shaking his head. Lance huffed, rolling his eyes. There it was, the explosive Keith he knew and did not love. Keith pinched the bridge of his nose and took a deep breath. 

"We're leaving in 45 minutes, get ready." He said with an attempt at a steady voice. A moment passed, when he quickly turned around and walked off in the other direction. For once, Lance didn't catch the little red hue that sat on Keith's cheeks. With a shrug, he closed the door.

Without much thought, he grabbed a random white t-shirt and black jeans and set on his way out the door. He was about to slip on some white Adidas shoes when something caught his attention in the corner of his eye. It was an old jean jacket that he decorated with pins and a black baseball cap that hung on a coat hanger near the door. He smiled, snatching both items and shoving them on. Lance stood in front of his mirror and marveled at himself. [He felt like he looked pretty good.](https://twitter.com/MizyMiyajima/status/841876941275832320) Not that it mattered, since he wasn't here to impress (that was a lie, he totally was). Feeling satisfied with himself, he walked out the door and was greeted with a surprise. 

Keith was at the end of the hall, pacing back and forth. That wasn't the surprising part though, since he seemed to always be lurking recently. What shocked Lance was  _what he was wearing._ Keith always gave the impression that he didn't care what he looked like, considering that god awful hairstyle. He even said it at one point, to no one's astonishment. But today was something different. He had on a gray and white striped shirt with a green coat thrown on. His beige jeans were rolled up to the ankles, and he had on some dark gray boat shoes. A dark gray beanie sat on top of his head and it almost covered his mullet fully.  _Almost._ It was borderline ridiculous how many times that man managed to make Lance  _feel things_. And to make matters so much worse, when he turned around to face him, he was wearing a pair of black framed glasses. [This motherfucker.](https://elentori-art.tumblr.com/post/150684461307/keith-in-various-korean-fashion-from-pinterest)

 _"What the fuck are you wearing?"_ Lance blurted out, unintentionally sounding very aggressive and angry. Which he was, because life wasn't fair and he hated Keith with a passion for being. Keith stiffened and crossed his arms over his chest as Lance made his way over to him.

"What?" He growled, glaring at him. "Allura said to dress like a civilian."

"Yeah, but-" Lance began but was cut off.

"So, what's the issue?" Keith gritted out between clenched teeth. Normally Lance would be slightly intimidated by him, but he could not take him seriously with those absurd hipster glasses on his face. He suppressed the urge to laugh.

"Nothing, nevermind." He cleared his throat to cover up the chuckle that bubbled in his throat. Keith thought nothing of it and started walking towards the hangar, where everyone would be waiting. Lance followed.

Walking through the halls so early in the morning was always surreal to him. The white halls that were always lit up and littered with people, suddenly becoming bare. The buzz of chatter and the grunts of effort from the training rooms ceased to exist. It made Lance uneasy. He always needed people around him, he hated being alone. Yet another difference Keith and Lance had. He was social, Keith was not. Once they reached the area, Keith swung open the door and the two were greeted with a giant hug. Lance wheezed as all the air in his lungs were squeezed out. Keith seemed to be in the same position.

"My boys! I'm so proud!" Coran, their strategist, celebrated. Keith was the first to wrench free of the old man's grip and dusted himself off. 

"We didn't do anything yet." He deadpanned as he stepped away, but Coran dismissed the comment with a wave, letting go of Lance. He was silently thankful that Keith was so moody, or else they might have been there forever.

"And I know you will!" He beamed, shooting them a thumbs up. Lance shot him a thumbs up back, which seemed to make him much happier.

"Now, Shiro and Allura are busy on their own assignment, so I am here to send you two off!" Coran said in that accent of his. For the longest time, Lance had tried to guess what accent the man had. Was it English? Australian? New Zealand? Who knew. Not Lance, or anyone for that matter.

"What assignment?" Keith asked, and Lance nodded in agreement. He had to admit, he was curious. What was so special that those two had to leave before two of their own went on the biggest mission after the big raid? Coran shook his head.

"Gathering intel," he answered vaguely. Lance narrowed his eyes and scanned his face. Nothing. That was the thing about Coran, Lance was never able to read him, not matter how hard he tried. It was unnerving and made him wonder what the old man did, before he was their strategist. He imagined it was some gritty stuff, because why else would he be completely unreadable? 

"Lance! Keith!" A voice called out to them, and he already knew exactly who it was. He turned around and watched Pidge run across a thin beam to slide off the edge of one of the plane wings. It amazed Lance how she could simultaneously be good at hacking and parkour. Behind her, Hunk decided to take the conventional route and used the stairs. 

"I decided to add some upgrades to the plane and your gear!" she smiled wildly and stopped in front of them, holding multiple devices in her arms. Hunk came running up to them.

"I helped too!" He added, looking proud of himself.

"Yeah, Hunk also helped."

"What stuff do you got?" Keith asked, and Pidge smiled evilly. 

"Well, I added a self-landing feature on the plane in case of emergency, tracking devices for you two to find each other, little mini bug bombs that can blow up a whole room, some lighting changes in case Lance wants to set the mood-" she was about to babble on more, but Lance stopped her with a hand covering her mouth.

"Thanks guys, we'll figure the rest out _on our own."_ Lance hissed at her and she laughed. Of course, she still wasn't done with the teasing. You call your rival cute  _one time_ , and she's all over it. Give him a break already!

"You two better get on your way to breakfast now!" Coran said cheerily, turning away from Lance to face them. Pidge and Hunk glanced at each other quickly.

"Alright, we'll see you guys whenever, good luck!" Hunk smiled and rushed out the door. Pidge mumbled something similar to him and followed after him, just as hastily. That was weird.

"Before you two leave, there is something I must tell you." Coran turned back to them, his tone going somber. Keith stiffened up beside him, flinching minimally. Coran looked around to make sure no one was around.

"Trust no one, but each other. Both of you are going into the mouth of the beast, make sure you don't get eaten up," he said with a low tone. Lance gulped, and looked at Keith. He looked completely unfazed by what Coran just told them, and gave him a salute. Clumsily, Lance followed and saluted. 

"Now, you two, get on that aircraft and take down the Galra!" The man laughed, slapping them both on the back as a little nudge forward. Lance stumbled a bit and smiled, looking up at the sleek white plane that stood before him. Coran's voice seemed to echo off the walls of the large high ceiling hangar. He waved them off and with a bit of reluctance Lance and Keith stepped onto the plane. Not that he didn't want to go on the mission, he just wasn't excited for this flight. He expected to be bored to death 1 hour in, and he wasn't looking forward to that.

The inside of the plane was more luxurious than Lance had initially imagined. Instead of the usual cramped walkway and dull, uncomfortable seats, he was happy to see that he was very wrong. The carpet was a fluffy gray with gold patterns on it, and the seats were big recliners that lined the wall, facing each other. The lights installed in the ceiling began to slowly alter between red, blue and purple when they walked in. Lance guessed that was one of the things Pidge and Hunk had tweaked for them. Keith waltzed in as if he wasn't standing in the most luscious plane in existence, and moved some silk curtains aside to go into the next section. Now feeling very excited, Lance followed him in and his jaw dropped. There was a massive velvet couch that was pushed against the wall and in front of it was a giant flat screen TV. A multitude of DVD's and tapes lined the shelves underneath the screen, and Lance felt like he was in heaven. He needed to go on missions more often.

He pushed past Keith and plopped onto the couch, reveling in the softness of it. He swung his legs over so he could fully lie down, his long limbs extending almost past the arm rest. Keith stood in front of him and glared as he watched him take up all the cushion space. Lance ignored his towering figure and relaxed into the sofa. He was disrupted by a nudge to his shin.

"Move over," Keith grumbled, crossing his arms over his chest. Lance peaked an eye open and closed his eyes again, completely disregarding him. Keith did not seem to like that.

"Move your stupid legs or else I am going to sit on you." He seethed, clenching his fists. Lance chuckled, tucking his legs in and Keith sat down next to him while mumbling silent curses.

A tall man moved the entrance curtains aside and cleared his throat. Lance opened his eyes and looked up at him. He was dressed in a black suit and had a pilot's hat on his head. It was safe to say that this guy was their pilot.

"All your stuff's in cargo, we'll be taking off in 5 minutes." His voice was low and smooth. "I'm your captain, Rolo."

Lance stood up out of his seat to shake his hand, "The name's Lance." Rolo grabbed it firmly and smiled, averting his eyes to Keith.

"I heard, and that is Special Agent Kogane?" He asked lightly. Lance noticed his grin was a little shifty, but decided to think nothing of it.

"Yep," he replied, popping the 'p'. "Or as I like to call him 'Mr. Grumpy Pants'"

Rolo laughed at that and Keith frowned. "My pants are pleasant, thank you."

"All right, well I'll be in the cockpit, you two enjoy the flight." He gave them a little nod and ducked out of the room. Lance watched the flaps sway back and forth a little, before finally coming to a stop. He turned towards the couch to reclaim his original seat, but saw that Keith had decided to drape himself across the whole thing. Lance sighed. He had it coming.

"Can you-?"

"No."

Well, he gave it a shot at least. Keith didn't even bother to open his eyes, and stretched his legs out comfortably. Lance groaned and reluctantly took the seat in the next room. As soon as his butt hit the leather seat, the plane suddenly lurched and began to move forward, causing Lance to clutch the arm rests tightly. A comical  _thump_ was heard in the other room, followed by a low and annoyed groan. Lance attempted to suppress a laugh when Keith stormed into the room immediately after, and sat himself down in one of the opposite seats. The  _click_ of a seat-belt being done up for good measure is what made Lance lose it.

_"What are you laughing at?!"_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> follow me on [tumblr](http://arisushanti.tumblr.com/) and [instagram](https://www.instagram.com/arisushxnti/) !
> 
> i made an inspo playlist based off this fic, you can listen to it on spotify [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/omgitsreynaa/playlist/4VUPrPU9xlMItnQUQCNF0F?si=qyDRQd9jTXOY-WpPiZBAhQ)


	4. 13 hours and 15 minutes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the boys set off on the longest most boring flight of their lives, which ironically isn't boring at all. lance loves naps apparently and also boys and girls.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i have no idea what i'm doing or how spy shit works at all. i'm just doing whatever the fuck and hoping it makes sense. partially inspired by the show "imposters" which doesn't detail much into the spy life but oh well. enjoy, ladies.

_13 hours and 15 minutes until destination_

 

"Hey, Keith?"

"What?" His response came out as more of a grunt than a coherent response, but Lance was able to translate.

"How much longer do we have?"

Keith paused, and Lance could only assume he was checking his watch. "About 13 hours and 15 minutes, why?"

"Because I'm bored," Lance stated, pressing a random button on the side of his chair. The back reclined a bit, and Lance held down the button in peaked interest to see how far he could go back. 

"We've literally been on this plane for 10 minutes," Keith sighed in exasperation. He was aware of the fact that not a long amount of time had passed. He couldn't help it though, he was prone to boredom. Lance had a habit of getting tired of things very quickly, and sometimes he couldn't even get the chance to start something without getting uninterested. It was one of the reasons why he had such a hard time keeping hobbies or even stable relationships. Wow, that took quite a turn, he did not mean to get so real with that.

"Yeah, I know, but still!" Lance complained. Keith ignored him and kept reading the book that was in his hands. 

"Go watch a movie or something," he suggested indifferently, not even sparing him a glance. Lance frowned and stared right at him. He _would_ go and do that, but he wanted to talk to someone currently. It was probably the socialite in him that was talking, or the unending anxiety for the upcoming mission that was creeping up, that tempted him to engage in conversation. Some people found it weird that he felt the urge to talk to people when he was nervous, but Lance found it pretty reasonable. It was an easy way to get his mind off of something, and potentially make someone's day better with a joke or two. 

Lance made up his mind and swiftly moved across the aisle into the seat right across from Keith. The man kept pretending to not notice him and read his book, turning the page. Lance knew that he was using the book as an excuse to not talk to him, and he wasn't even reading it. Lance was looking. Keith made the mistake of glancing up at him, and was met with the most convincing pout ever conceived. Not even a moment passed before he groaned and reluctantly put his book down, not bothering to mark the page.

"Fine, what is it?" He caved in with a sigh and Lance grinned. That worked every single time he used that look on anyone. Hunk once said that he could probably get someone to kiss his feet if he tried hard enough. The thought of Keith bending down to do that filled him with a giddiness that he dubbed as very unnatural, and borderline kinky. 

"Nothing, just wanted to do some icebreakers." He replied casually, trying to purge the previous thoughts from his mind. This was not happening again, not today.

"Why do you care?" He questioned, avoiding Lance's careful eyes. 

"I thought that since we are going to be together for a while, I should know something about you." Lance shrugged. He didn't really have a specific thing he wanted to talk about, he just needed some distraction. And if that meant conversing with the enemy (who was now his partner and he needed to stop calling him rival/enemy), then so be it. Lance made another mental note on trying to not refer to Keith as his rival or the enemy.

"That's stupid, you know me." Keith grumbled, but Lance could tell he wasn't as reluctant as he let on.

"I know that you always have an 'RBF'." He chuckled, and felt a bit of satisfaction when Keith tilted his head to the side in confusion. He had a look on his face that so obviously said  _'What the fuck is that?'_  that it was almost laughable.

"It stands for 'Resting Bitch Face'," he cleared up. "It means you always look angry or bitchy."

"Then why couldn't you have said that in the first place?" Keith asked, and it looked as if the explanation had him more puzzled and annoyed. "Also, I don't always look angry."

"You're frowning as we speak, Mullet."

"Just leave me alone, please," he gritted out through clenched teeth.

"Come on, don't be like that!" Lance smiled.

"Stop," his voice became strained with effort as he tried not to get angry, but Lance was too busy teasing him to notice.

"Why don't you ever smile, man! Come on, why are you so angry?"

"That's because you're annoying!" He abruptly blew up in his face. Lance blinked in surprise at the random outburst. He suddenly just remembered why he doesn't talk with his fellow teammate. He was always so serious and angry all the time  and Lance did not like to get yelled at for trying to make friendly conversation. His expression hardened and he got up out of his seat. Keith watched him stand up and make his way to the door, his expression remaining hostile and irked.

"I'll leave you alone then." Lance left the room before Keith could yell at him more. He popped a random DVD into the TV and plopped back onto the couch. Lance watched as the opening scene for Mary Poppins came on screen, and he drifted away into his thoughts. 

* * *

_10 hours and 40 minutes until destination_

 

Lance was about halfway through the movie and drifting asleep, when someone knocked on the wall before the entrance to the TV room. He groaned, hoping to God it wasn't Keith. Although, knowing Keith he probably wouldn't bother knocking and would walk straight in. He grunted as a signal for the person to enter, and the curtains pulled away to reveal a very beautiful woman with high blonde pigtails.

"Mr. McClain, I made breakfast, you must be hungry!" She pushed her cart in and Lance's mouth began to water. The smell of bacon and pancakes filled the air, and his stomach grumbled very loudly. He chuckled in embarrassment.

"Yeah, I am," he replied sheepishly and watched as she pressed a button on the wall. A circular panel on the floor began to rise up and turn into a table, right before his eyes. The stewardess set three plates down that were filled with every delicious breakfast food he could think of. He hastily grabbed the fork and knife out of her hand before she could even set it down, and sloppily shoved a sausage into his mouth. 

"I'm Nyma," she smiled alluringly. "Just press that button if you need me. I'd be happy to help you with  _anything you'd like._ "

She pointed to the little red button on the TV remote that had a picture of a lady on it. The fact that it was a lady on the remote was a bit stereotypical in his opinion, but he didn't feel like advocating that at the moment. He was too enamored with the waffles. Wait, did she just flirt with him?

"What a lovely name, mine's Lance." He tried to speak with a mouth full of food and make it sound smooth, but he ended up just feeling stupid. Nyma laughed, so he guessed that his charm managed to shine through.

“Well, call me if you need anything, _Lance_ ,” She said with a wink as she tested how the sound of his name sounded on her lips. Lance thought it sounded pretty good. She pushed the empty cart out of the room with a smile, and Lance was able to breathe again. God, why were there so many beautiful people in this line of work? First his captain, his teammates, the flight attendant, and even the god damn pilot! Thank goodness he didn’t go for a desk job. 

“Look at you, smiling like an idiot in front of a pretty girl.” Keith laughed sardonically. Lance’s head whipped around to find Keith leaning against a wall inside the room, arms crossed and eyes peaked with interest. He didn’t even notice that he entered. 

“What, are you here to mock me?” Lance spat out, having still not forgiven him for earlier. Keith’s teasing smirk remained unwavered.

”That’s an additional bonus,” he replied coolly. Lance frowned. This guy was always either yelling at him or making fun of him, and to be honest he was getting sick of it.

”Alright, well leave me alone then, I’m starving.” He turned towards his already almost finished plates of food and felt his stomach lurch. Okay, in reality he was actually quite full, but Keith didn’t need to know that. He didn’t really seem to care about the state of his hunger and scratched the back of his head awkwardly.

”I was, er, wondering how you were holding up?” He said that as more of a question than a statement. Lance stared up at him in confusion and scanned his face. He didn’t look very insincere or sarcastic. That didn’t stop Lance from replying with as much bitterness as humanly possible.

 _”Why do you care?”_ He asked instead, resorting to mocking Keith’s grumpy voice . That seemed to work, since his smirk faltered a bit and he narrowed his eyes.

”I don’t really, I just needed napkins and didn’t want you to act like a baby, so I tried  _‘to get to know you,’”_ he sighed, putting air quotes around the ‘get to know you’ part. Lance huffed and forcefully shoved a stack of them into his open hands. Keith blinked at them, as if he was shocked that Lance had actually gave them to him. Why was he so surprised? It wasn’t like he was going to rob him of his napkin rights just because he didn’t like him. That would just be plain cruel.

”What?” Lance mumbled, when Keith still hadn’t left the room, standing there like a lost puppy. He pursed his lips together, as if he was struggling to find what to say. Finally he shook his head and turned around.

”Sorry about earlier,” he muttered lowly under his breath and briskly walked out. Lance stared at the spot where he just stood. Was that an apology? Thinking back on it, he doesn’t think that Keith has ever apologized to him for something. He couldn't blame him though, because he hadn't apologized to Keith for being an ass either. Lance couldn’t help the small upwards quirk in his lips that had formed. 

* * *

_9 hours and 35 minutes until destination _

  

At this point, Lance seriously thought that he was going to die. It's only been about 3 hours and he was already losing his mind. He tried to watch another movie, but he couldn't bring himself to sit still for the duration of it without getting bored. He couldn't even sit through Jaws, and that was _basically_ the best movie in the entire world! That's how you knew he needed to do something else, if he couldn't bear to watch a shark movie. If Keith found out that he had such an obsession with the creatures, he'd probably get teased into oblivion. But, come on, how could you not love them?

Lance groaned and flopped face forward onto the couch, drowning out the sounds of utter boredom that came from his mouth with a cushion. Maybe he could go check on his _favourite teammate_ , see how he was bearing this. He ran through the limited choices he had and decided that he essentially had no better option. Lance said that to himself a couple times as reassurance that this wasn't an excuse to talk to him. 

Slowly, he pushed himself away from the comfort that was the fluffy cushions, and tip toed toward the curtain that divided the two sections. He peaked his head in to survey if there were any present threats. To his surprise, Keith was nowhere to be found. He shrugged and leisurely walked in. Again, Keith was still somehow missing. Lance narrowed his eyes and walked further down the aisle. Maybe he was in the washroom or something. He passed each leather recliner after leather recliner and as each seat went by, he began to suspect that the man was dead. Or constipated 

Lance was approaching the end of the aisle, about to give up his search for the man and attempt to do something else, when something hit his thigh. Baffled, he looked down, and there in the very corner seat that was second to the end, curled into a ball was Keith Kogane, asleep. His dumb glasses were lopsided on his face and his hat had been removed, being used as a pillow instead, as he leaned against the pristine white wall of the aircraft. His book laid open and face down, precariously sitting on top of his knees that were held close to his chest. Lance froze and stood there for a while, watching the gentle rise and fall of his chest. The scene was almost surreal. It felt so unnatural to see his face all relaxed and tranquil. In contrast to the typical scowl and scrunched up face, this Keith in front of him looked, well, fast asleep. Now he felt stupid for making that bet with Pidge that the stone-faced combat specialist would sleep with a permanent glare glued on. 

Without thinking, he plucked the book off of his knees and sat down in the seat across from him. He turned it over in his hands to look at the title.  _Fahrenheit 451._ Lance recalled briefly that Pidge mentioned it one time, but he couldn't remember what it was about. Something about paper burning at that temperature. He marked the page that Keith had it open to and flipped to the first page. It wasn't like he had anything better to. Plus, he never got the chance to read books often, so this would probably be good for him. 

So, he sat there quietly and read, letting the sound of Keith's silent snores carry him away into the words on the page.

* * *

_7 hours until destination _

 

Lance's eyes fluttered open and he shot up to an upright position. The book that was on his chest fell to the ground, and he noticed that a suspiciously familiar green coat was draped over him. He picked up the book and the jacket, laying it in the seat in front of him. Wait, where was Keith? Lance realized that he probably fell asleep while reading and Keith woke up to go do something else, other than stare at him. The sound of a giggle caught his attention and he slowly stood up, grabbing his black cap that had fallen to the ground and putting it on. He silently crept his way to the curtain dividers and couldn't help but eavesdrop on the conversation that was taking place.

 _"Wow, you're so built, Keith!"_ A female voice gasped, and Lance could only assume that was the flight attendant, Nyma. There was some heavy breathing and a gruff male voice spoke out.

 _"Since when did we become first name basis?"_ The man rasped sounding out of breath, and Lance could obviously tell that was Keith, he knew that voice anywhere. Wait, why did he sound so out of breath? Why is she commenting on his build?  _What the fuck were they doing in there?_  Multiple unfavorable scenarios ran through his head, but he stayed quiet. 

 _"Sorry, I couldn't help it, you're just so attractive..."_ she drawled out. He heard some shifting, and suddenly a loud thump of someone being shoved against a wall. Nyma yelped out in pain and Keith growled.

 _"Don't fucking touch me!"_ he yelled, and even Lance flinched. He's never heard him so angry before, and that was saying something. He heard Nyma whimper at that.

 _"What the fuck?!"_ she cried out, and Lance heard her struggle to get up. There was the sound of a fist punching the wall and a small gasp of surprise. Lance couldn't resist peaking in and what he saw was not what he expected. Keith was covered in sweat, shirtless, and towering over Nyma on the couch, a hand planted right next to her frightened face. He was staring at her with such intensity and fire that Lance felt scared _for_ her. He had no idea why the hell Keith didn't have a shirt or was covered in sweat, but he knew it wasn't because of  _other activities._ He wasn't like that. Or at least Lance hoped he wasn't like that. He could only guess that he was working out before, since the man always had to stay in shape for fighting. Nyma shrunk down into the cushions and clenched the arm rest so hard, her knuckles turned white. Lance backed away from the curtain so he wouldn't get spotted and continued to listen.

 _"Don't think I don't know what you're playing at,"_ He spoke lowly and venomous.  _"I've been on countless assignments with the same pilot and staff the whole time, why are_ you _here now?"_

Everything was dead silent. No one spoke, no on moved, no one breathed. After a tense minute of nothing, Lance heard movement. His instincts told him that he shouldn't be crouching there, so he darted all the way back to his original seat. Just as he reached the chair, Nyma burst out through the curtains, a seized expression on her face. He opened his mouth to talk to her, but saw that her eyes were red and decided to say nothing. She passed him without giving him any acknowledgement and slammed the door to the staff room closed. Well, that was a weird exchange. Lance got up and made his way over to the TV room to see how Keith was doing. This was probably the worst idea ever, since the man was absolutely terrifying when he was angry.

"Hey, man, you good?" he called out, stepping into the room. The lights were shut off, the only illumination coming from the tiny crack in the curtains that had come to a slow close behind Lance. Keith was in the middle putting his shirt back on when he turned around to face him. Lance only got a quick glimpse of Keith's bare torso before he pulled his shirt down. His face was contorted into a deep scowl, but when his eyes met Lance's, they softened ever so slightly.

"This flight attendant is pushy," he explained vaguely, knowing full well that Lance heard everything. He looked almost unfazed by the situation as he grabbed his glasses and put them back on again.

"What happened anyways?" 

Keith turned away from him, so he couldn't see his expression. His hands twitched minimally into a fist, but released quickly. That was odd. 

"I was trying to work out, and she just-," Keith paused for a moment, thinking of what to say, "-came onto me."

"Oh." That was all that Lance could say. He didn't have any words for once, which was very rare. Lance thought about how he was flirting with him earlier, and now she moved on to Keith. His heart dropped a little. Of course she would go for Keith, who wouldn't?

"Well, at least you know that girls like you, bud!" Lance chuckled faintly, nudging his arm. It was Keith's turn to scan his expression. With a sigh, he sat down on the couch, running a hand through his messy hair.

"I'm not really interested in that kind of thing," he replied. There he goes again with the vague answers. What was that even supposed to mean? Not interested in relationships? People? Girls? He couldn't resist the swell in his heart when that thought came to mind. He should really stop all this fantasizing about Keith. But of course, he never listened to himself and decided to take a chance.

"What do you mean by that?" he asked, trying not to sound too hopeful. He sat next to him, and Keith flinched. 

"What do you mean 'what do you mean'?" he directed the question right back at him, seemingly perplexed by it.

"I mean, do you not want a relationship with anyone?" Lance's voice was small, like a child talking to an adult. Keith didn't make any moves to answer the question, and leaned over to grab the remote that fell on the ground from the little fiasco earlier. He pressed a button on it and the lights turned back on, except they were alternating between red, blue and purple again. The two gave each other a look of _'What the heck?'._ Keith pressed the button again, but they refused to change back to normal. He began to press the button rapidly, but still the lights remained the same. 

"I think Pidge programmed it to do that when the two of us are in the room together," he stated obviously with a shrug and put the remote back down again. "Wait, what did you ask again?"

Lance sat still, looking into his eyes. He wanted to ask again, wanted to try and attempt to break that wall that was wedged between them, but he knew that would never happen. He wanted to get it over with so he could finally get rid of these weird thoughts and feelings officially. It would have been much easier to keep living if he did. If he just confirmed that he had absolutely no chance at all. That would have made everything much better. Maybe his subconscious was just toying with him and making him like the first guy or girl that was next to him. He didn't want to think himself into a circle, so he just went with that conclusion and dubbed this whole situation as 'not his fault'. Yeah, that's what he'd do.

"Nothing, don't worry about it." Lance sat up suddenly, and made his way toward the exit. Keith seemed surprised and almost disappointed that he was leaving, but that expression quickly faded into his usual aloofness. "I'm just gonna go back to sleep, I'm tired, you can use the TV if you want."

He gave him a quick little nod, and did exactly that. Lance lingered in the doorway for a moment, in hopes that he could gather the gut to say something, anything. He shook his head. This was pointless. He left without another word, and sunk into the first chair he could find. His body relaxed into it, and he let out a sigh of content. After a quick nap, he would definitely be back to normal. His normal, extroverted, talkative and not-interested-in-teammates self. He tried to convince himself for the next 5 minutes that this was all normal, and that he was just sexually frustrated, but even his inner thoughts sounded like liars.

"Whatever," he mumbled under his breath and reclined the chair back. He'd worry about his internal strife later, and hopefully forget about it. Lance's eyes drifted close and before he knew it, he had fallen asleep.

* * *

_5 hours until destination _

 

The sound of typing at a keyboard was the first thing that Lance registered before he fully woke. Slowly, he opened his eyes groggily and sitting right in front of him was Keith with a computer on his lap. Lance blinked awake and stretched his arms and legs out, letting out a little moan of relief. Keith glanced up at him briefly before his eyes went back to the screen again. Lance looked around to check the time, but realized there was no clock anywhere.

"Hey, how long have I been out? And what time is it?" he yawned. That was a hella good nap, and he finally felt like he had a full 10 hours of sleep. Keith squinted at the time in the corner of his screen.

"About 2 hours, and it's five to 4:00pm," he replied and immediately went back to typing. Well, shit, he slept for longer than he intended. Still worth it, though.

"What are you doing on there?" Lance asked. A small voice in his head wanted Keith to say 'Minecraft'. He looked like the kind of guy who would play Minecraft.

"Shiro emailed me the hotel details and budget for the mission," he said, pointing to the screen. Lance moved around to peer at it from behind his shoulder and his jaw dropped when he saw the amount of zeros that were there.

"A million dollars?!" he cried, his eyes bulging out of his sockets. What did they think they were going to be doing in Japan? 

"That's the minimum we're given. We can actually use up to a full three million and even a bit more," Keith said, as if it was the most normal sentence in the world. 

"Is that normal?"

"It's a bit more that what I usually get, but yes."

Lance couldn't help but be shocked. That was a lot of fucking money. This mission must be crucial if they're willing to put in millions of dollars into it.

"Yes, it is important, so you better not screw it up." Keith said, practically reading his mind. Lance blinked and looked up at him. So, he wasn't that bad at reading people than he let on. 

"If anything I should be worrying about  _you_ screwing things up!" Lance shot him a glare and an accusatory finger as he settled back into his original seat. Keith rolled his eyes and shook his head. Even though his words were aggressive, it was obvious that there wasn't any real threat to what he said. 

He went on with what he was doing on the laptop, leaving Lance to stare out the window in silence. With a couple hours of more sleep, he was finally able to gather his thoughts together. He was just nervous that this first big mission he was on could be detrimental if he fucked it up. That was it. And if some of the symptoms of it happened to be an unusual attraction to his despised teammate, then so be it. God, his feelings and thoughts were all over the place. Did he hate him? Did he want to fuck him? Neither? All of the above? Lance instinctively chewed on his nail as he glared out the window at the bright blue sky. 

"Whatever you're thinking so hard about is not worth it. Don't want you to blow a fuse up there from all the effort, " Keith let out a little breath from his nose that could barely be categorized as a laugh. Lance did the only mature thing he could think of, and stuck his tongue out at him. 

"Oh, look, the robot is capable of caring! This is a major breakthrough!" He retorted sarcastically and Keith raised an eyebrow, looking up from the keyboard.

"Who said I cared?"he scoffed, closing the lid and sitting forward. Lance shifted away slightly, but refused to back down.

 _"Oh, Lance, I am so worried about you! Please confide in me and don't worry about a thing!"_ he cried dramatically with a butchered impression of Keith's voice, if he was a damsel in distress, that is. Keith rolled his eyes.

"Only one of those things was what I said, and just barely."

"Was it the  _'I am so worried about you'_ bit? You don't need to say anything, I know it was," Lance chuckled and gave him a little wink. Did this count as flirting?

"Whatever helps you sleep at night, McClain." And Keith was back to opening up the computer and typing away. Seriously, what else could he possibly be doing?

"What are you even doing on there?" He vocalized his thoughts, and Keith looked up.

"I'm practicing my identity for Japan," He answered. Now this had Lance interested. He maneuvered so he was looking over his shoulder again. On screen, Keith had written down multiple personal questions and typed out a response for each of them in the perspective of his fake identity that Shiro had given him. That was right, he almost forgot that they weren't going to be Keith and Lance there. He would be Christian Lacroix, the leader of the notorious french gang, Lame de Marmora. And Keith would be Ryan Ishikawa, Christian's right hand man and translator. Lance remembers arguing if he could have the surname Lavigne from the list of surnames that he could choose from, but Shiro shut him down. He said something along the lines of 'if you make an Avril Lavigne reference at any time, you will instantly get shot and killed'. 

"Oh," he said lamely. He didn't really want to admit that it was a good idea, even though it was. Allura had given them a full profile of their new identities, including hobbies, favourite books and even as far as their favourite drink to get at a bar. His was supposed to be a Cosmopolitan, which he didn't mind all too much. They didn't have to necessarily follow the exact details that they were given, but it was to give them some idea on the character they should put on. Part of this job was keeping up a facade, an identity when you were doing infiltration missions like this one. The higher ups give them a play, and they simply carry it out. Judging from what they detailed on his page, Mr. Lacroix was a very flamboyant, yet cold person. Not drastically different from his actual personality, which he was thankful for. 

Keith on the other hand had alot of acting and practicing to do. From what he remembered reading, Ryan was hesitant and reserved, borderline timid. To sum it up, he was to be a regular businessman who got sucked in to some questionable activities after his friend asked for a favour. Basically, it was almost the complete opposite of how Keith was in real life. The upside was that Lance would get to boss Keith around in public, and he would be powerless to do anything but follow along. 

"I hope you know your character well," Keith huffed. He was probably a bit annoyed with what kind of person he had to play. Serves him right for always acting like he was better than him. 

"I do, do you?" Lance shot right back at him. Keith grimaced and nodded reluctantly. He wondered how difficult it would really be for him to go through with this. Oh well, Lance was living the life to be honest.

"Yes, I am a reluctant thug who was dragged into this mess by my 'good friend' Christian Lacroix," he deadpanned, adding the quotations in that were present on the actual sheet that was given to him. To be honest, Lance had no idea what that was even supposed to imply, but he guessed he'd have to find out later.

"And I am a sexy badass mafia leader with a taste for blood and money," Lance laughed and gave Keith another wholehearted wink. God, he could not stop.

"Yeah, well, you can taste my ass,  _Lacroix_." Keith huffed and put his laptop down, making his way to the staff room where the washroom was. Lance resisted the urge to mutter an  _'I wish'_ and instead settled for snooping on Keith's laptop.

As soon as the door to the staff room clicked shut, Lance jumped into Keith's seat and had the lid open. He minimized the tab that Keith had opened and noticed that his background was a picture of himself and the rest of the team (before Lance had joined team Voltron). They were standing in a field, all smiling and sweating from what looks like a day of rigorous training. He smiled a bit at the sight of everyone looking so happy and began looking through his images folder.

Unsurprisingly, he had multiple pictures saved of different sickly sharp knives. The man had a weird obsession with them that was honestly not that shocking. Next, he snooped through some of his songs, which consisted mostly of classic rock and Lady Gaga for some reason. To be fair though, Lady Gaga was a queen and no one could convince him otherwise. In summary, everything on it was very Keith-like and there wasn't really anything that was new to him (except the Lady Gaga part, maybe).

Lance decided to call off his little raid, and returned to the tab that he was on. He was about to close it, but hesitated when he saw the program Keith had open previously. It was the profiling system that they used to identify people, and it had nearly every single person in the country (and parts of other continents) registered on it. Typically they used it to I.D. people or check their criminal record and personal details. That wasn't the part that caught his attention though, the weird part was that the two people that Keith had searched for were Nyma and Rolo. And along with their names in the search bar, in big bold letters in the middle of the screen were the words  _' **No results'**_. Lance gulped, and blinked at it to make sure he was seeing this right. That couldn't be possible. He re-typed their names individually and pressed enter, in case something went wrong the first time Keith did it. The same words appeared on the screen, and Lance felt a chill run down his spine.

"Would you like anything to drink?"

Nyma's sweet voice spoke from over his shoulder, and Lance instantly slammed the laptop shut. He slowly turned around to shoot her a nervous smile. Her expression was the same as it always was, normal and pleasant, but there was something else about her now that just seemed... Off.

"No, I'm good, thank you," he coughed politely and tried to casually move back to his original seat, clutching Keith's computer in his hands.

"What was that that you were doing?" She asked sweetly, leaning in to him. Lance inched backwards.

"Uh-," he struggled to think of an answer, "-playing Minecraft."

Lance wanted to smack himself at the answer he had given, but Nyma smiled with emotionless eyes.

"Alright, well, I'll be in the cockpit if you want anything!" she turned around, her pigtails swaying with her movements, and walked towards the door. She reached towards the doorknob to open it, but Keith swung it open first from the other side and they stood face to face. Nyma shot him a look that Lance couldn't really make out and Keith pursed his lips together. They walked past each other in silence and Keith returned to his seat. He looked back at Lance and when he saw his computer in his hands, his expression darkened.

"Dude-!" Lance whispered harshly, but Keith cut him off.

"I know," he said lowly. "Don't eat or drink anything else."

"Maybe Shiro and Allura are using people who are off the grid, so the Galra won't track them back to us?" Lance suggested hopefully. He knew he felt something sketchy about those two, but this was starting to get concerning. 

"Where's your gun?" Keith asked, and Lance felt a surge of panic. He patted the back of his pants, where he usually tucked his pistol in under his shirt, but it wasn't there. He always carried it around with him, in case there was any trouble and he could protect himself, but suddenly it was gone. He never removed it, and he sure as hell knew that Keith didn't take it. Lance shook his head slowly, and Keith sighed in exasperation, pounding his fist against the armrest.

"I knew it," he tapped his foot on the ground and stared off into the distance, thinking. This was getting bad. They both willingly hopped on a plane with two strangers that weren't even registered in the system, and were most likely not part of their spy ring. 

"What do we do? Are we sure that they're bad?" Lance whispered, leaning in and covering his mouth, just in case they were somehow watching or listening in. Keith nodded grimly.

"I'm pretty damn sure, since she tried to steal my knife while I was working out earlier."

Oh, so that's why he lashed out. That made much more sense. Did Keith know that they were bad news before? His job was supposed to be to read people and see if they were being dishonest, but he got so caught up in the fact that a pretty girl was giving him attention, that he didn't even notice they were suspicious. He felt a bit stupid.

"Do we just wait it out?" he asked. Keith looked out the window and glared at it in thought. 

"I think we have to," he replied. "I mean, unless you know how to fly a plane."

"What about that thing that program that Pidge installed?" Lance suggested. He remembered that Pidge mentioned something about a new system that can land the plane safely, he had no idea how it worked, but he hoped it functioned. They might need it. 

"First, let's tell Shiro and Allura that the mission's been compromised," he said hurriedly and grabbed his phone from his back pocket. He tried to turn it on, but the screen remained black. Keith looked at it in confusion, smacking it against his hand a little. 

"Let me try mine," Lance suggested as he grabbed his from his jacket. He pressed the button to turn it on, but nothing happened. He rapidly pressed the ON button in panic, but still nothing happened. Oh, no.

"Shit!" Keith cursed, running a hand through his hair. It seemed like they already got to their phones and somehow disabled them. He guessed they used either an electromagnetic pulse or just straight up hacked into it.

"Try the computer?" Lance handed it back to him, and he opened it up. It was still working, which Lance praised the Lord for. He went into his email and started typing out a quick 'Help us, we're on a plane with people who most likely are going to kill us later' message to both Shiro and Allura. He finished and was about to press send, when the screen froze up.

"You're shitting me," he cursed harshly, and smacked the screen. Surely enough, it began to glitch out and shut down right in front of their eyes. Lance looked at him with concern. Looks like they somehow got to the computer. Just then, the door to the staff room opened up, and instead of Nyma coming in, it was Rolo. 

"Hey guys, are you have trouble with your phones?" he asked, showing his phone and made a show of trying to turn it on. Of course, it didn't work. The two looked at each other and Keith responded.

"Yeah, what happened?" he asked hesitantly, watching his expression carefully. Rolo shrugged, shoving his hands in his pocket.

"Shouldn't you be-oh, I don't know-flying this plane or something?" Lance narrowed his eyes suspiciously at him. He laughed.

"Autopilot, man, it's a godsend."

"Right..."

Keith cleared his throat, "So, what do you think happened?"

"Maybe because we're so high up, the signals are getting messed with," Rolo offered halfheartedly with another shrug. Keith and Lance both knew that was complete bullshit.

"Maybe," Lance trailed off, not taking his eyes off of Rolo for a single second. He shifted uncomfortably under Lance's gaze. 

"I'm going to go back to the cockpit, if it starts working again, tell me!" He hurried quickly into the staff room and away to pilot the plane. Lance let out the breath he didn't know he was holding.

"We've got to get out of here." They said simultaneously. Lance guessed by the sun setting that they had about 4 hours left to go. The only issue was that they were hundreds of feet off the ground and neither knew how to fly a plane. But it would only take time until Nyma and Rolo realize that they're onto them and try to take them out now. The thing that confused him was why they didn't just instantly kill them. It was obvious that Nyma took Lance's gun, so why didn't she shoot him the second she obtained it? Whoever they worked for wanted them back alive.

"For now, act normal, but we need your guns back." Keith said, and he got up from his seat, making his way to the staff room. Lance hissed at him to come back, and hastily got up after him. He approached him from behind and Keith whipped around with a finger to his lips to shush him. The two stood outside the slightly ajar door and listened. 

 _"We've got to get rid of them!"_ Nyma whispered loudly, and Lance heard Rolo put a hand to her mouth. 

 _"They're right outside, you need to be quiet!"_ he said, his voice low and threatening.

 _"The tall one already knows about the identities! They know!"_ she insisted. Rolo sighed.

 _"Just stay quiet and do what we're told, it'll be fine,"_ he replied quietly trying his best to sound calm and collected. Nyma scoffed, and Lance imagined her flipping her hair back along with it.

 _"Alright, whatever!"_ Footsteps approached the door they were crouched near and the two instantly bolted back to their seats. This was the second time this flight that Lance eavesdropped on someone and also the second time he nearly got caught. The door slid open with a click and out came Nyma with her cart in tow.

"Hello boys, are you hungry for dinner?" Her grin was so sweet and bright that Lance found it hard to believe that she had asked for permission to kill him merely a minute ago. He opened his mouth to accept the offer, when he remembered that _she asked for permission to kill them merely a minute ago._ He gulped, and shook his head.

"I'm good, Nyma." It was his turn to give her a dazzling smile. Keith grunted in response as a way of saying _'What he said'_  and looked away from her.Nyma's smile faltered for a millisecond before it replaced itself with an even happier one. Lance narrowed his eyes.

"Are you sure?" she asked politely. "I have some delicious burgers with fries!"

"We're on a diet," Keith interjected. 

"Well, I have some fresh Caesar salad as well," she countered, her face going darker. She took a small step forward and kept her nice smile going.

"Allergic," Keith simply stated, and stood up to challenge her. Nyma's face dropped and she looked him up and down, huffing.

"To the whole salad?" 

"To your cheap perfume."

Lance almost burst out laughing at that, because _holy shit_ he didn't know Keith had those kinds of roasts up his sleeve. She was taken aback at the comment and glared at him. Keith glared right back, and Lance feared that she'd kill him right then and there. The two stared each other down and Lance could practically hear the curses that she was sending towards Keith. Thankfully, she stood down and flashed them another smile.

"Alright, if you get hungry, just call me!" She whipped around and aggressively pushed her cart out. The table cloth that was covering it fluttered up a bit at the sudden movement, giving Lance a peak inside. He caught a glimpse of shiny metal in a familiar shape and held back a gasp. It was his gun. 

He turned to Keith, but he already had his eyes trained on the weapon under the cart. Nyma left the room and the door clicked shut. Instantly, Lance's mouth was running.

"She has my gun, she has it! What do we do? I need to get it back, because just then she looked like she was going to shoot you where you stood! Speaking of which, what the hell is wrong with you? Don't provoke a girl who is friends with the guy that is keeping us alive while we're thousands of feet in the air! Also don't provoke a girl who has a _god damn gun!_ " Word vomit spat out of his mouth before he could stop it. He honestly didn't want to. He was beginning to freak out.

"Calm down. Here." Keith reached into a secluded side pocket in the chair and pulled out a sleek black handgun carefully. Lance's eyes lit up and he instantly snatched it out of his hands, turning it around in his hands.

"My glock! Oh, Teresa, I'm so glad you're with me in these trying times!" He cried, practically caressing the weapon. He tucked it back in it's usual place, in the hem of the back of his pants and hidden by his shirt. Even though it was uncomfortable, it felt good to know it was there. 

"You named your gun? And Teresa of all things?" He scoffed.

"Don't listen to him, Teresa, your name is great!"

"You're ridiculous."

Lance chuckled and shrugged his shoulders. "Maybe. Meanwhile, I guess we really do have to wait it out? Hope that they were talking about a video game they are very passionate about? Sleep with one eye open?"

Keith nodded, "Let's go and do that."

* * *

_ 1 hour until destination _

 

It's been quiet. Way too quiet. After Keith and Nyma's standoff, nothing had happened and the two were left in relative peace. Neither Rolo nor Nyma have appeared to shoot anyone in the face, which was good. But the fact that nothing has happened didn't settle quite right with Lance. Half of him thinks that they were being paranoid and have misunderstood alot of things that had happened. The other half thinks that there's a bomb on the plane and they were all going to be blown to bits once the hour is up.

The plane was approaching Kobe Airport where they would land and get escorted by someone who was already stationed there, posing as another member of the Lame de Marmora. Keith had been surprisingly calm throughout the 4 hours that passed and Lance wondered if he was planning something. Probably not, he was always the kind of guy who'd stab first, then think later. It'd get him into lots of trouble and he'd always get an earful from Shiro afterwards, with Lance chuckling in the background. 

He had taken advantage of the time had had to run over what they were going to do once they landed in Japan. Someone by the code name, Rose, would take them to their hotel and give them an update on anything new with Lotor. Then, they would check out the different locations that the new weapons were suspected to be, just in case they could find them and destroy them early instead of waiting for the banquet to find out. After that, it was all down to making connections and gathering intel before the big party comes rolling around. On paper it seemed very simple, but Lance knew that would not be the case. One slip up and he'd have a bullet in his brain.

Lance glanced at Keith who was sitting across from him. He was in deep thought, looking out the window at the orange tinted sky. The sun should be rising right about now, and he made a mental note to try and watch it. If he wasn't killed by then, at least. Keith felt a pair of eyes on him and looked back at Lance. Their eyes met for a moment until Lance broke the contact. They were both thinking the same thing.  _Something's wrong._

* * *

_10 minutes until destination_

  

A loud _thump_ sound broke the silence, like someone's head hitting a wall. Lance jolted to a standing position and Keith whipped his head around. They looked to where the noise had come from and became confused when they realized it was from the direction of the TV area. Keith looked at Lance, his eyebrows knitted together and they both got up to inspect. No one had gone in there, so what could it be?

Keith entered first, pulling the curtains back and Lance stepped in behind him. The lights went to its usual mode of alternating between their signature colours, but this time they ignored it. Lance looked around and saw that no one was there and nothing in the room had fallen. So-

"What was that?" he thought out loud. Keith gave the room a quick look over and shrugged.

"I don't know," he replied. They might have still been freaking out for nothing, but this was too strange.

_THUMP!_

There it was! That sound! It sounded like it was in the room they were in. Lance walked up to the wall on the far side of the room that was supposed to be the very back of the plane. 

"It came from over here," he trailed off, staring at the white wall. Keith approached from behind him and stared at it. With a hesitant hand, he hit on the wall with two swift knocks. It sounded hollow. They waited in silence. After some time, nothing came, so this time Lance knocked. Just once, simple and hard. 

_THUMP! THUMP!_

To their horror, the wall replied with two knocks of their own. Lance's eyes widened and he stumbled back. This was some freaky ass paranormal shit right here. Keith instantly had a knife in his hand and before Lance could stop him, he plunged it into the plaster. The wall broke easily and Keith began to furiously cut out a makeshift rectangular window with his knife. He tore off the piece of cardboard that had been cut and when he threw the piece away, Lance couldn't believe what he was seeing.

A man and a woman were gagged and piled on top of each other, and as soon as Keith broke down the "wall" the smell of blood reached his nose. The man on top was very obviously dead, as his eyes were staring into the distance and there were multiple bullet holes going through his chest. The woman underneath however was alive and her eyes were wide with fear and pain. Lance looked down and saw that she was shot in the hip. They were both wearing pilot and stewardess uniforms.

"Holy fuck!" Lance suddenly felt very nauseous and even Keith blinked at the sight in surprise. He shook himself out of his daze and immediately started tearing the rest of the cardboard wall down, Keith following his lead. The fake wall was completely ripped off, and Lance saw that the room actually extended about two feet longer originally. Nyma and Rolo did this, he knew this for sure. The two dragged the dead pilot off of the woman and Keith cut her bounds off. She gasped and her hand shot to cover up the bullet wound in her hip. 

"You two-," She breathed out and winced as blood started gushing rapidly out of her hip. "They found us. We're all going to die."

"We need to get out-," Lance started off, but stopped when he felt the familiar press of a cold metal gun barrel being held to the back of his head. He knew this sensation all too well. An audible  _click_ of the safety being turned off rang through the air, and he didn't dare to breath. He looked at Keith who was standing in front of him and his eyes were narrowed down in fury, his jaw clenched tight with tension. 

 

_"You're not going anywhere."_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> jeez that was a bit bad and much longer than i intended it to be. i was originally aiming for 6k words but it ended up being around 8.5k? well, enjoy that then. also disclaimer: i've never actually read the book that was mentioned in this chapter, "Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury". i just remembered a friend mentioned it once. 
> 
> if youre enjoying this so far, i'd love to hear about it, so leave a comment! or alternatively go to my tumblr and send me an anonymous ask saying how much you hate me. either works.
> 
> follow me on [tumblr](http://arisushanti.tumblr.com/) and [instagram](https://www.instagram.com/arisushxnti/) !
> 
> i made an inspo playlist based off this fic, you can listen to it on spotify [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/omgitsreynaa/playlist/4VUPrPU9xlMItnQUQCNF0F?si=qyDRQd9jTXOY-WpPiZBAhQ)


	5. Let's Try To Not Crash and Burn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the only break these boys will catch is when they're dead. (literally)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> side note: in the next chapter i'm going to be bringing in some good ol' japanese speaking keith. i just wanted to know if you guys want the japanese to be romanized or in the original kanji/hiragana. just shoot me an ask/message on tumblr or comment which one you'd prefer.

Lance wondered if this was going to be how he died. Getting shot in the back of the head by a beautiful lady on a plane to his very first assignment. To be honest, that would suck. He didn't enjoy the thought of getting killed on literally the easiest part of the mission, which was getting to the area. He always imagined he'd die in a super glorious way. Like blowing up an entire building full of nazi's, or jumping into a pit of zombies as a distraction so his group could run away. That sounded much better in his opinion. 

Keith's hand instantly shot to grab the knife he kept under his coat, but the sound of another gun cocking had him freeze. From the corner of his eye, he saw Rolo step in from behind Nyma, a silenced pistol in his hand. Oh, so that was how they killed the pilot and nearly killed the stewardess, which speaking of, she had collapsed onto the floor still attempting to slow the bleeding.

Even with a gun pointed at him, Keith still looked like he was about to charge the guy. He hoped that he wouldn't, because that was definitely a stupid idea. Rolo gestured at his arms with his gun and Keith reluctantly put them up and behind his head, surrendering.

"Get down," Rolo commanded, tightening his grip on the handle. Slowly, Keith moved to the ground and got on his knees, hands still behind his head. Lance looked at him, and he knew they were thinking the same thing. 

_How were they going to get out of here?_

"You too, get on your knees!" Nyma yelled and shoved Lance forward with a rough push to his back, causing him to stumble forward. He reluctantly complied and got down beside Keith, his arms in a similar position behind his head. Normally he wouldn't mind a girl asking him to get on his knees, but this wasn't one of those times. 

"If you're going to kill us, do it already," Keith sighed, his expression completely apathetic. Jesus, man! He had gotten used to Keith's reckless persuasion and manipulation tactics, but this wasn't a good moment to be using them! Rolo narrowed his eyes.

"No thanks, we're going to haul you off to a very far place where you're going to be asked a couple of nice questions," he replied. 

"So, you're not going to shoot us?" Lance asked. He needed information on how much they knew.

"I'm sure as hell not afraid to," he answered darkly. 

"Then fucking do it!" Keith shouted, pressing on. Seriously, what was up with him and telling everyone to shoot him?

Rolo looked him up and down, and hesitated for a moment. He glanced at Nyma and she nodded her head at him, giving him a look that Lance couldn't decipher for once. Rolo seemed to give in, and Lance's heart began to pound. Were they seriously going to kill them? He gave a nod of affirmation towards Nyma and she smiled. Without hesitation, she moved the gun's aim off of Lance's head and pulled the trigger. A loud bang echoed through the plane and the sound of a body hitting the floor rang in his ears. She had shot the stewardess who was unarmed and already bleeding out, hanging on to life by a mere thread. She fell to the ground without a sound and Lance felt a twinge of guilt in his stomach. He hadn't even learned her name.

Keith grimaced, and hardened his gaze on Nyma. She turned towards him, dramatically putting the muzzle of the gun to her lips and blowing the top, as if there was old-fashioned steam coming from it. 

"If you don't want that to be you, I suggest you keep quiet and do what you're told." Her eyes glinted darkly. Lance had to bite his tongue from snapping back with a snarky comment. At least they wouldn't kill them right away. They had many chances to do so, so the fact that they didn't means that they're boss wanted the two of them alive. 

"Looks like we're approaching our destination," Rolo chuckled. Lance peered outside the window behind the TV and saw that he was right, the island of Japan was slowly coming towards them. He gulped, and looked back at the two hijackers in front of him, then at Keith beside him. There only shot at winning was to attack Nyma once Rolo went to the cockpit to start their descent. He tried to relay that message to his partner just by looking at Rolo, then turning towards him. For once, he seemed to understand and gave the very slightest nod, just in case the other two saw them communicating.  

"Who do you work for?" Keith then asked, facing them again. 

"You'll figure out eventually," Nyma responded with a laugh. They're smarter than they look for not giving away who their boss was.

"Is it the Galra?" Lance spoke up. Rolo shook his head.

"No," he said and Lance was about to facepalm. He took it back, _he_ was stupid.

"Ebony Dragons?" 

"Stop asking, I'm not going to tell you," he replied with a huff, moving a piece of hair out of his eye. There it was, that's what he was looking for. A tell. They put the wrong guy on an infiltration mission, Rolo was terrible at lying. Especially when that mission involved taking the deadliest agent in the ring and the agent with the sharpest eye, as hostages. So, it was the Dragons after all. He figured it had to be some sort of Japanese gang that hired them, since they were going to the country and all. All he hoped was that the Galra don't know about their mission. At the very least, he hoped they didn't know what they looked like so it would be fine for them to go undercover without having to alter their appearances. 

"Rolo, it's time." Nyma spoke out, gripping the stolen gun in her hand. Lance tensed up. This was it, their only shot. He glanced at Keith to make sure he was ready, and when he saw that his hands were already twitching, he smiled. Rolo nodded slowly, but instead of making his way down to the cockpit, he brought a little remote out of his jacket pocket. All he did was press a red button, and suddenly Lance felt pressure in his ears. It was the pressure of when you started descending from high altitudes. 

He resisted the urge to scream. Of course Pidge and Hunk told them about the new feature. They probably wanted them to test it out and give them feedback afterwards on if it worked or not. Lance felt a drop of sweat roll down the side of his head and he gulped. Now what were they going to do? His heart began to thump loudly against his chest and thoughts raced by in his head.

_Couldn't they just tackle them to the ground? No, they're not that stupid and slow, they're probably trained. What if they waited after the plane landed? That would be too late, and they'd probably get instantly bound from head to toe. Make a run for it? No, dead. Try to fight? No, dead. Distract them? No, dead. Wait for help? No, dead._

Lance turned to Keith and he pursed his lips together. They were in a bind. Nyma and Rolo were too focused on them, they wouldn't be able to move an inch without the trigger getting immediately pulled. They needed a distraction. But who would come to their rescue? No one. They had to save themselves, like they always did. But how? Lance focused in and tried to think. There was nothing he could do, or think of to do. Every single option would just get them killed. He didn't want to die yet. He glanced out the window and saw that they were getting close to the ground. Judging by the look of the area, they were landing in Kobe Airport, their original landing spot. Would this 'Rose' person come help them? Probably not. At this point, they were probably already dead, whoever they were. Lance and Keith were done for. His shoulders slumped forward as he gave up. Nothing could possibly save them now. 

And suddenly, by the grace of God himself, the plane blessed them as it began to shake. For the first time during their smooth and luxurious ride, they were getting turbulence. Nyma stumbled back a bit as the plane began to rumble, and Rolo reached out to steady her, stepping behind her and gripping her shoulders. Keith was the first one to take advantage of the brief second of confusion, as if he had been waiting for that exact moment to come. 

He shot up to his feet like a rocket with a knife in hand, and before Nyma could even begin to register what was happening, he plunged the blade deep into the side of her neck. She sputtered and coughed, her eyes blown wide with shock as Keith roughly twisted the blade then took it out again, crimson blood exploding from the gash. Her knees gave in as the life quickly slipped away from her and she started crumpling to the ground. That was when Rolo began to shoot.

Lance was up on his feet in an instant, and he rolled out of the way of the shots. Keith grabbed Nyma's falling body by the pigtails and used her body as a shield to block all of Rolo's shots. The man stopped shooting to surge forward and grab Keith, but he pushed Nyma's dead weight onto him. Her body lurched forward and slumped against her partner, pushing him out the door and giving Keith the opportunity to duck behind the wall. Lance looked at him from across the opposite side, gun already in hand. Keith looked up as well, and when their eyes met, he smiled. It was a victory smile. 

"You motherfucker!" Rolo bellowed in fury, pushing Nyma's body to the ground. "I'm going to kill you and your stupid little boyfriend!"

Excuse me? Lance felt totally offended. He was not the little one in this relationship, Keith was much shorter than him.

"Fucking do it, bitch!" Lance hollered. This is what he lived for. To his surprise, he heard a little click, and suddenly something was being thrown inside their room. It took half a second to realize what it was, and another half of a second to turn away from the object and cover his ears. The stun grenade blew up with a loud bang and a bright flash of light. The sound was so loud that even with his hands covering his ears, it had his ears ringing. Rolo jumped in and turned on Keith, who was now standing in the open, dazed and blinded. 

_Oh, hell no!_

Rolo turned his back to him with a gun in his hand aimed straight at Keith's head, but Lance was tackling him to the ground, just as he squeezed the trigger. The shot went wild, hitting the TV screen to Keith's left instead and Lance had Rolo pinned to the ground, his gun falling out of his hand. 

His eyes went wide with fear, "No, man, please don't shoot!" He cried out, tears welling up in his eyes. Lance looked closely to study him. Tears poured down his face, but his eyes were still completely emotionless. This fake bitch. Lance got off of him and stood up, dusting himself off with his spare hand, and he kicked Rolo's gun all the way across the room. The man got up to scramble for it, and Lance sighed.

"When you see Nyma tell her that neither me nor my boyfriend are interested," he said darkly and just as Rolo had turned around to face him with his gun in hand, Lance had already put a clean bullet through his head, right between the eyes. His body collapsed in a heap on the ground with blood pooling around him.

"You shouldn't disrespect the dead like that," Keith commented, dusting himself off. His clothes were covered with blood and he was still stumbling and disoriented from the flashbang, but the man was alive. And so was he.

"Says you!" Lance threw his hands up in the air in protest. "You stabbed a woman and then used her body as a meat shield!"

"It was a tactical necessity."

 _"You shouldn't disrespect the dead like that,"_ Lance mocked Keith's previous words.He rolled his eyes.

"Whatever, let's just get off this damn thing, I want to get out of these clothes." Keith crinkled his nose up as he inspected the state of his outfit. His new white striped shirt was now ruined, unfortunately. Although it could be much worse, that blood could have been his own.

The universe seemed to love perfect timing, because just on cue the plane lurched again and the pressure in Lance's ears stopped, signalling that they have landed. He let out a sigh of relief.

"Finally, this plane ride from hell is over!" He cheered, and raced towards the exit, carefully maneuvering his way around the bodies that lodged the walkway. They stood in front of the exit door, and automatically it started to open. That was new. The door slid open with the stairs extending downwards, and at the bottom of it was a big burly Russian man with some heavy artillery in his arms. Lance blinked in surprise because he was _not_ expecting more company. 

"You two are going to di-!" He started to bark out, raising the big gun in his hand towards them, but three quick shots to his head stopped him in his tracks. He fell sideways and a young man from the sidelines came jogging into view. Now Lance was even more confused. Not because of how quickly the big man died, but at the appearance of the man who had killed him. 

 _"Pidge?"_   Keith sputtered out, clearly just as surprised as Lance. The man stopped in front of the stairs, an assault rifle in his hands. He looked like an older, taller and fancier version of their very own teammate, which was seriously tripping Lance out. He was wearing a full suit and tie accompanied by some sick men in black style shades. He would have looked super sophisticated, if it wasn't for the fact that it looked like he had just participated in a wet t-shirt contest that used blood instead of water. The Pidge lookalike slung his gun over his shoulder and flashed them a smile.

"Nope, even better. I'm her older brother, nice to meet you two!" He took off his sunglasses and gave them a wink. Seriously, why was everyone in this job so god damn attractive?

* * *

When Lance heard the name 'Rose', he expected this beautiful red haired woman who would threaten to crush his head between her thighs once he inevitably started flirting with her. It turns out he was completely wrong.

"-Your Pidge's brother?" 

"-Why is your code-name _'Rose'?"_ Both Keith and Lance asked their question simultaneously. The other man chuckled.

"Yep, Matt Holt at your service," He gave them a little salute. "And it's because I always give new people a rose when I pick them up."

Lance frowned. Why didn't they get one? Not that it really mattered, but now that he said that he would have liked to receive a nice bouquet. Just as a nice little 'Hey congrats for surviving on your way here!' In this case, he felt like he deserved it. Matt caught the wistful look on Lance's face and laughed again.

"Don't worry, I still got you two something!" He pointed towards an out of place car that was parked on the runway, among all the other planes. Lance finally looked up and took in the rest of the setting they were in. He finally realized why Matt was so bloodied.

There had to be at least twenty-no, thirty- men in similar black suits littered across the whole landing area. Their bodies lay on the ground in a pool of blood around themselves, and Lance looked at Matt in surprise. Did he do all of that by himself? Here he was fretting over two amateur plane hijackers and this guy waltzes in and murders a whole field full of them. He had to admit, he was impressed.

Keith spoke up before Lance could, "I'm impressed with the body count." 

"All in a day's work, now let's get you two out of here and in cleaner clothes," He said with a shrug and ushered them towards the slick black car. Lance passed some of the victims of this man's terror and was even more impressed by the precision of the kills. Each of them had gotten two or three bullets directly in the head or the neck area. This guy was seriously good. 

Matt reached the car first and popped open the trunk. He pulled out three different sized white button up shirts and threw them toward Lance and Keith's faces. He caught it with ease and quickly began to strip off his shirt. He didn't give a damn if he was in public, the stickiness of his shirt and the metallic smell of the blood grossed him out. He swiftly buttoned it up, pleasantly surprised when he realized that it was in his size, and tossed Matt his old one. Without looking up he caught it and shoved it into the trunk, closing the door. Lance caught a quick glimpse of what was inside of it and it was pretty safe to say that if ever they ran into some more trouble, they wouldn't have to worry about any weapon deficiency. This guy seemed to be prepared for anything, he even thinks there were some harpoons in there. Lance didn't want to know what scenario Matt imagined would happen while he shoved that harpoon in there. Someone cleared their throat in front of him and Lance looked up. Keith was on the other side of the car giving him an impassive look.

"Couldn't you have changed later? Or in the car at least?" He rolled his eyes, swinging the door open to step inside the car.

"I have no shame when it comes to this beautiful bod!" Lance called with a wink and sat down in the seat next to him. Even the car was fancy as hell with all its black leather seats and multiple buttons that Lance was tempted to press. Matt hopped into the driver's seat after changing out of his bloodied attire. He had ditched the suit jacket and stuck with the plain white dress shirt. He couldn't believe how ironic it was that they all wore white shirts while their jobs revolved around killing people.

Matt fired up the engine and the vehicle hummed to life. God, he absolutely adored that sound. Along with the car, the CD player also turned on and Lance's eardrums were bombarded with loud pumping bass and a [haunting female vocal line](https://youtu.be/ebb5AinKxWI?t=38s). Keith almost jumped out of his seat like a cat, and Lance flinched a bit at the sudden sound. Matt chuckled awkwardly.

"Yeah, sorry about that, I like my bass," he apologized quickly, but made no moves to turn it down. "Now, hold onto your socks, boys!"

"What's that supposed to-?" Keith started off, and Matt slammed on the gas. The car lurched forward and so did the two of them, having not done up their seat belts yet. Lance's hand shot to the seat in front of him to keep his face from getting smushed against the black leather. Keith was not so lucky.

"Ow, shit! What's wrong with you?" he snapped at Matt. The other simply gestured with his head towards the way they came from. Lance turned to look out the rear window and suddenly understood why. 

A whole militia of men with giant guns had burst out of the airport doors. One particularly tall man among them-which was saying alot considering they were  _humongous-_ was shouting orders to the rest of them, pointing straight at their car that was speeding away. He was thankful for their expensive sports car that easily drove away, even as bullets came in contact with the windows. They didn't break, and he realized that they were bulletproof. Again, Lance was thankful for their expensive sports car.

Matt went all the way around the whole airport and sped his way towards the single road that connected the building to the mainland. Kobe Airport was relatively small and built on the water with only one way to get in and out. And that was the bridge. They didn't even bother to stop at security, running right through the wooden fence that was put up to stop any intruders. Lance looked at the glass booth where you were supposed to give your I.D. and saw that the man inside it had been shot and killed. He hoped that those thugs killed him and not Matt. 

Keith looked out the window again and he cursed loudly as shots blasted against it. The Dragons had followed them with cars of their own and they were not that far behind. A loud pop was heard and suddenly the car became tilted and nearly swerved out. Matt managed to gain control of the vehicle and yelled his own string of curses. Those bastards popped one of their tires. Their car was going much slower than before and they were only halfway through the bridge, at this rate those thugs would catch up with them. Lance looked around the car for something he could use to slow them down when a thought clicked in his head. They literally had a whole arsenal of weapons (including a harpoon)  at their disposal in the back. He was an idiot for not thinking of this sooner.

"Help me get these  _hooligans_ off our backs!" He yelled to Keith over the loud gunfire that was still insistently hitting against the rear window. The man nodded, and they reached behind their backseats to grab whatever weapons they could get their hands on. Lance was so glad that Matt was so prepared for everything and that the trunk connected to the actual interior of the car. He pulled out an [M4 Carbine](https://www.range365.com/sites/range365.com/files/styles/1000_1x_/public/images/2017/05/m4a1_acog.png?itok=qcAnKWrA&fc=50,50) assault rifle and smiled. Now this was what he liked to see. Keith grabbed an [SA Vz-58](http://www.luxguns.com/3244/csa-vz58-sporter-compact-223rem-color-black.jpg) rifle and shrugged, not really knowing much about guns to make any judgments about his pick. 

"Matt, keep it steady!" Keith yelled out and Matt responded with a grunt, clutching the steering wheel. He flicked the safety off, slid open the roof of the car, popped his head out and began to lay down heavy fire on the pursuing cars behind them. Lance gave an appreciative whistle when he saw the shots that Keith landed on both the driver and the person in the passenger seat. The car swerved off the side of the bridge and into the water below. He had gotten better. But Lance wasn't about to let Keith show him up in his strongest suit. 

Determined, Lance put down his window and slid his upper body out of it so he was sitting on the ledge, using his other hand to grip the inside of the car so he wouldn't fall out. His torso leaned out the car and he aimed his gun up at the driver of the next car. He squeezed the trigger and let loose a flurry of bullets, every single one of them piercing the mans body and splattering blood all over the windshield. It began to turn off course towards the edge like the first car, but it seemed that the person in the passenger seat managed to grab hold of the steering wheel. Lance instinctively ducked into the car again as shots whizzed past his head. He waited until they had to reload and then peaked out again, shooting the man who was attempting to steer the car right in the head. The car swerved to the side and smacked into a pole as Lance watched with satisfaction. 

He ducked in once more and counted the cars that were still left. About 5 of them. Lance heard Keith take another shot and yet another vehicle went off road and crashed, catching fire. Make that 4 left. Keith came down from his position to grab another magazine from the trunk and sat forward to face Lance. 

"This shit is harder than it looks, McClain." He took out the empty magazine and replaced it with the new one he grabbed.

"You're pretty good," Lance commented, and cocked his gun. "Not as good as me though."

 _"ROCKET LAUNCHER!"_ Matt roared, and Lance whipped around. One of the gang members was making his way out of the window like Lance had been doing, a giant rocket launcher in hand. He knew for a fact that these already fragile windows were not explosion-proof . God, why couldn't they give them a second to cool down?

Lance was already sitting on the window ledge again with his gun in hand when the rocket was fired. Time slowed down and he focused in on the high speed explosive that was headed straight for them. He didn't have time to take in a deep breath or to properly aim down his sights or to do anything for that matter, he just reacted and pulled the trigger. The rocket exploded in the air just behind them, raining down ash and smoke. Without wasting any time, Lance moved his sights to the man who held the rocket launcher and shot him right in the head. His body fell out of the car and onto the road along with the giant weapon in his arms. Thank god that was out of the way.

"Jesus, Lance!" Matt whooped from the front seat as Lance retreated back into the car. "Nice shot!" 

He would have said thank you and gloat a little, but he was honestly too busy freaking out. Adrenaline rushed through him and his heart beat loudly in his chest. There were still a lot of them left and the rear window of the car looked like it was about to burst. All it would take was one heavy shot and it would-

_CRASH!_

In the same instant a loud boom sounded, a giant hole pierced through the window. That was definitely not a normal bullet. It sounded like some form of sniper rifle shot, but he couldn't recognize the exact model. Lance shielded his eyes from the pieces of glass that had fallen out. They needed to take out those last four cars,  _and fast_. With the window compromised, their driver was now very vulnerable to a sniper shot if they could get the right angle. And judging by the now broken window, he assumed they had one. Keith grabbed Lance's shirt collar and pulled him down, just as heavy fire broke out.

"What do we do?" Keith yelled at him over the loud winds that whistles through due to the giant hole in the glass.

"I don't know!" Lance yelled back. He tried to peak and see if he could get another cheeky shot in, but once a bullet sailed past his cheek, he shrunk back down again. "Matt? Anything?" 

"Almost to the transfer point! We need them off our tail for this to work though!" He responded, when suddenly his eyes lit up. "Wait, take this!"

Matt tossed a small green object over his shoulder to Lance and he caught it in his hands. It was a grenade. An idea began to form in his head.

"Hey, Matt, do these bullets have full metal jackets?" He yelled.

"Yep!" Matt called back, and made a sharp left turn and Lance finally noticed they weren't on the bridge anymore. Keith and Lance held on tight to each other's arms to avoid getting thrown against the side of the car. Lance turned to him. 

"Okay, you're going to time the throw of that grenade so it explodes while the first car is right under it," He instructed to him. Keith nodded, barely questioning his plan and taking the bomb from his hands. Lance opened up his clip to see how much ammo he had left. About ten bullets, he hoped that was enough. He nodded to Keith for him to do it, and Keith pulled out the pin and let the handle release, holding it in his hands for a couple of seconds. 

_1.. 2.._

Then, he threw it out the window and two seconds later it was detonating at the perfect time. Lance sprung up and looked to see if it worked. The first car had swerved to the side to avoid the explosion, blocking the road and all of the cars that were behind it had crashed into them. Perfect, exactly as he planned. As their car sped away from the crash site, Lance held the sight of his gun to his eye. He drew in a breath and focused his aim to the fuel tank of the first car that was now exposed. Without another thought, he let loose everything he had left. It wasn't until the last bullet hit when a good spark finally lit, causing the entire vehicle to explode and spurring a chain reaction among all of the cars from the amount of heat and force generated from the initial explosion. Lance watched his fiery handy work disappear into the distance. 

"What the fuck was that?" Keith breathed out, as he finally sat up normally in the seat

" _A_ _wesome,_ is what it was!" Matt cheered, speeding away from the crash site and leaving the thugs behind. "How did you know that only metal jacket bullets can blow up a car?"

"Research and science," Lance replied smugly. He was an agent specializing in long range weaponry, of course he knew how to blow up a car with guns. Diesel was too thick and oily to be lit up by a normal match or bullet because there wasn't enough spark to light it. The spark to ignite it needed to be hotter that that, and a bullet covered in metal travelling at high speeds was definitely enough. Thank god he took the initiative to learn that instead of trusting all those action movies. 

"I hate to spoil your fun, but we're not done yet." Keith pointed behind them, and it looked like one of the cars had not blown up from his little scheme. Matt shrugged.

"Don't worry about it, they're too far away and we're going to lead them away anyways," he said. Keith and Lance looked at each other in confusion. 

"What do you mean by that? How?" Keith asked. 

"You'll see," he replied suspiciously with an evil grin spreading across his face. Now he knew where Pidge got her scheming face from. 

Matt kept driving, totally unconcerned at the car still pursuing them that was a few hundred feet behind them. Lance was thankful for the small break so he didn't complain and instead took the chance to catch his breath. He didn't think that this mission would be so intense right from the get-go. He was already totally exhausted and thoroughly surprised that he wasn't dead four times over. To be honest though, he missed this feeling. That rush of adrenaline in the middle of a fight, the hyper focus that occurred when he aimed at a target, the fluidity of his movements when he got into the zone. It was amazing, and he had almost forgotten what a real fight was like, not a training exercise or sparring match.

He glanced at Keith who was leaning back into his seat with his eyes closed. Lance could tell he wasn't asleep though. He looked like an absolute mess. His new white shirt that he had received was already dirtied with soot and it stuck to his chest from the sweat. He couldn't say much though because he probably looked pretty similar to him. Lance was so deep in thought that he didn't even notice when the car suddenly stopped. Keith's eyes flew open and he was instantly sitting up in his seat. Before he knew it, Matt was opening the door on his side.

"Hurry, get out!" He said hurriedly and had what looked like an Xbox One controller in his hand and a small remote with a red button on it in the other. Confused, Lance stepped out of the car and realized they were stopped in the middle of the road. Before he could ask why they were parked there, Matt was guiding them roughly off the empty road to hide along the side of a brick building. Keith broke free of his grasp and glared at him.

"Tell us what's happening right now!" He said harshly. Matt put a finger to his lips to shush him and pulled him down to a crouch, looking back at the car they had abandoned. In his hands, he pressed down the X symbol in the middle of the controller and it lit up green, signalling that it was on. The two of them reluctantly stayed quiet and crouched down next to him, waiting to see what he was planning. Matt pressed down the right trigger and to Lance's surprise their car began to move forward automatically. Did he somehow connect an Xbox One controller of all things to their ultra fancy (but now totally wrecked) sportscar? He swore, if Matt was just going to start playing some real life Mario Kart, he'd honest to God shoot himself on the spot.

"What the fu-?" Lance mumbled and Keith was the one to shush him this time. Matt moved one of the joysticks to the left and the car turned to face a park that was just up ahead. And without any hesitation, he unceremoniously drove it straight into it. The car managed to get about two feet into the park before it crashed into a tree. Seriously, what the hell was happening? The one car that was pursuing them pulled up, and when they saw the crashed and smoking car, they all grabbed their guns and ran towards it. Matt turned towards them with his back facing the park, the second remote in his hand.

"Congratulations, Keith and Lance!" He said cheerily. They were both stunned to silence at the random compliment and the whole scene in general, to be honest. They watched as the five men that were chasing them ran up to their crashed car and with exactly perfect timing, Matt pressed the red button on the remote in his hand and their vehicle blew up in a giant fiery explosion. The five men died instantly, their bodies bursting into pieces by the sheer force of the blast. Even Lance could feel the heat that radiated form the debris, and he was almost two hundred meters away. Some nearby trees had caught on fire, and he slowly looked at Matt. He probably had on an expression that showed such utter bewilderment, because Matt had the nerve to chuckle again. 

"You two are now officially dead!" he said with a smile. Lance and Keith turned to each other, then back at Matt, yelling in perfect unison.

 

_"What?"_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ah yes, the classic "survive getting killed by plane hijackers, kill about 20 thugs from the most dangerous gang in the country in a car chase and fake your own deaths in a car explosion" tactic. and can i get a round of applause for that foreshadowing in the god damn title of the chapter AND the notes, haha. although sadly, i just found out that it is extremely difficult to blow up a car via. fuel tank and bullets, so take this random bs solution instead. 
> 
> also matt's code-name is a reference to [that one scene](https://youtu.be/1u6grlyGFWE)
> 
> also i am now going to attempt and update schedule of 4-7 days between each chapter. as i go on, it'll probably narrow down to a specific set of days, but for now take that incredibly vague statement. no promises though, because im bad with deadlines :)
> 
> follow me on [tumblr](http://arisushanti.tumblr.com/) and [instagram](https://www.instagram.com/arisushxnti/) !
> 
> i made an inspo playlist based off this fic, you can listen to it on spotify [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/omgitsreynaa/playlist/4VUPrPU9xlMItnQUQCNF0F?si=qyDRQd9jTXOY-WpPiZBAhQ)


	6. Welcome to Japan! | 日本へようこそ !

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the boys finally get a break. ish. they get to rest physically at least.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> dear lord, please stop complimenting me, i don't deserve this praise. but seriously thank you so much to all the nice comments. i've been feeling super shitty lately (mostly feeling insecure about my writing etc.), but all of your kind words have really helped me carry on. i am so glad that you are all enjoying this as much as i am!

When Lance said he expected to die on this mission, this wasn't what he meant by that.

"What do you mean we're officially dead?" Keith asked incredulously, staring blankly at Matt. "We're standing right here."

Matt shook his head and explained. "No, Lance McClain and Keith Kogane were in that car getting chased by the Ebony Dragons when they suddenly lost control and crashed into a nearby park, killing five other men along with themselves. The explosion was so hot that it melted and burned all their flesh into ash, so only some of their bones are left now."

Lance blinked and Keith looked even more lost due to that morbid explanation. Did this guy just fake their own deaths for them? Without them even knowing? This definitely wasn't in the mission outline. The sound of multiple sirens could be heard in the distance and Matt continued on a bit hurriedly.

"You two are Christian Lacroix and Ryan Ishikawa, members of Lame de Marmora and you are here to attend the gala thrown by the Galra to celebrate their success and do business," he lightly grabbed them by the elbows and led them away towards the back end of the building they were hiding against. They wrapped around the side of it and Lance saw that the place was some sort of storage unit. Large white trucks were parked in front of large white garage doors and boxes were lying around in random places. Among those white trucks was a modest Nissan that was considerably less flashy compared to the car they were using previously, but still expensive looking enough.  

"You faked our deaths  _for us?!_ _"_ Lance asked in bewilderment, letting Matt lead him away. He couldn't believe what was happening. He gave an apologetic smile and nodded. 

"Allura contacted me last minute and gave me a new outline, so I carried it out," he shrugged. "Now, let's actually get out of here."

"Why didn't she tell us then?" Keith questioned him, a small of edge to his voice that Lance couldn't tell if it was out of anger or tension. Matt shrugged helplessly again and brought out a pair of car keys. He pressed the unlock button and the car beeped, lighting up and he casually walked up to it.

"You should be talking to her about that, not me," he swung around to the right side of the car and peered over the hood at them, an expectant look on his face. Lance frowned, decided that he really didn't have any other choice and stepped into the car with Keith doing the same. This time, Lance made sure to put on his seat-belt immediately. Thankfully Matt didn't pull any wild stunts this time and simply backed out of the driveway, going around to the main road that they were on before. He looked out the window and watched as they passed by their burning car with the tree they had crashed it into almost completely engulfed in flames. At least the park was small and not some huge forest. He wouldn't think he would have been able to forgive himself if he unintentionally helped start a whole forest fire.

"Where are you taking us?" Keith sat forward to try and face him, he seemed pretty shaken up even if it didn't entirely show on his face. Matt didn't meet his eyes.

"To where we were always supposed to go to," he replied. "Your hotel."

"Oh," was all that Keith could say before he sat back into his seat again. The fire disappeared into the distance and Lance let out a deep breath.

He made it. This was it. The big leagues. He is now officially on his first assignment, and has already survived the first stage. A part of him wanted to know why they had to go through all the trouble of pretending to blow themselves up though. No one else had to do something as extravagant as this, or at least to his knowledge no one else had to do this. Did Allura know that the Dragons were onto them? Is that why Coran said that little spiel before they left? There were so many questions he had, but the biggest one that kept coming back was  _'Just what was he getting into?'_

Matt suddenly perked up, as if he just remembered something, "Oh, I almost forgot! Here you go, both of you!" He opened up the middle armrest of his seat where you would normally store CD's and he pulled something out of it. Lance realized that they were two slightly crumpled roses, but instead of the usual red one's they were a light lilac colour. He reached out and grabbed them both from him, handing the other one to Keith who seemed quite taken aback. Keith tentatively took it from him and inspected it with a furrow in his brows.

"Why purple? Why is it always purple?" He asked with a frown, and gave it an experimental sniff. 

"Pidge specifically told me to get a lilac rose when she heard that I was escorting you two," he said. Lance wanted to scoff because of courseshe would insinuate their relationship through  _rose colours_ of all things. Very funny, Pidge. He was genuinely surprised that he actually kept to his word, though. He had almost completely forgotten about the whole ordeal, but receiving it gave him some weird little hope about the whole situation. He pursed his lips into a half smile, bringing the flower up to his nose to smell it. It was nice. He didn't notice that Keith was looking at him, until he started speaking.

"What's wrong with your face?" he asked almost aggressively, then grimaced as if that wasn't what he meant to say. Lance whipped his head to face him with a frown.

"Nothing's wrong with my face! What's wrong yours, huh?" Lance shot back childishly and Keith rolled his eyes, biting the inside of his cheek.

"No, just-! Shut up and hold still for a second," Keith started to lean towards him and Lance panicked, swatting him away. 

"What are you doing? Get away from me, man!" Lance retreated to pressing his back against his door in an attempt to run away from him. Keith closed the distance, raising his hand up to his face, and Lance half expected to get slapped or punched. Instead, Keith held the side of his face with his hand and used his thumb to wipe something away from under his eye. 

"I meant to say you had some blood on your face," he huffed, leaning away from him again. Lance blinked and hoped to God that he wasn't blushing right now.

"You didn't have to do that," Lance turned his red face away from him in an attempt to hide his embarrassment. Keith wiped his thumb on his jeans and crossed his arms over his chest, grunting in response.

"Speaking of," Matt spoke up. "You guys can't walk around looking like that."

Lance refrained from looking offended, because first of all he could walk around looking like  _anything_ and still look fantastic. Matt pointed with a thumb behind them to the trunk.

"There's some more suitable clothing for you guys in the back," he said, then focused his attention back onto the road. Lance looked at Keith then shrugged, reaching into the back and pulling out a hanger with a suit on it that was covered in plastic. He slowly peeled away the plastic wrap that protected the outfit, and when he saw it his jaw dropped. Keith looked at him confused, trying to get a peak of what it looked like.

"What's wrong?" he asked. 

"I am not wearing this," Lance said bluntly, completely taking off the rest of the protective plastic and turning it around to show Keith. When he saw it he started snickering, and held a hand to his mouth to try and suppress his laughter. 

"You're going to have to," Matt sympathized, unsuccessfully hiding his smirk. 

"I don't want to!" Lance hissed, shoving the suit back into the trunk. "It looks absolutely ridiculous."

"Come on, Lance, I bet you could pull it off," Keith said mockingly. Lance glared.

"Shove it, Mullet!" he huffed, crossing his arms. "I refuse."

"Well, Keith why don't you look at yours!" Matt suggested, a grin creeping up on his lips. Keith shrugged, and reached into the back grabbing his own plastic covered hanger. He brought out his knife, that still had a bit of crimson on it, and cut it open with a swift move. He looked at the outfit and his eyes widened, almost threatening to bulge out of their sockets. Lance saw what got him so upset and began to die of laughter.

"Holy shit! I take it back, I love this Matt!" he wheezed. Now it was Keith's turn to glare.

"I am not going out in public in this," he deadpanned. 

"Well, we're approaching our destination so you two better haul ass into those clothes, or else your cover will be blown out of the water!" Matt said. Keith and Lance looked at each other and frowned. Looks like they didn't have much choice for this one. Or with anything for that matter. 

"Did Allura tell you to give this to us?" Lance asked skeptically. Matt shook his head.

"Nope. My sister."

"Of course she fucking did."

When Lance got back from this mission he was definitely going to kill her for putting him through this immense struggle.

* * *

"Mr. Lacroix, get out of the car."

"I don't want to," Lance grumbled, crossing his arms over his chest in an attempt to cover up his absurd clothing that he was forced to change into. Keith seemed to be feeling the same way, judging by the awkward way he was leaning against the outside of the car. They had finally arrived in an area filled with people that didn't want them dead and if Lance had any say, he would have loved to step out of that car and take in the scenery of being in a foreign country. But the bottom line was that he looked stupid.

"Mr. Ishikawa, get him out of the car," Matt sighed and glanced at his watch with a frown. Keith adjusted his clothes uncomfortably.

"No, thanks," he said in a mumble. The only thought that comforted Lance was the fact that Keith looked equally out of his element as he felt. On his top half, he had on a white dress shirt with a regular light grey suit jacket accompanied by black and white floral patterned bow-tie. Not that unusual. But on his bottom half were matching light grey  _shorts_ that reached above his knee, with high socks that had the same pattern as his tie. And don't get him started on the shoes. Initially, Pidge had arranged for Keith to wear fucking  _sandals._ God damn open toed sandals. It was horrifying enough to be wearing a  _[suit](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/36/33/e8/3633e845dfdbb31d56e425fd3dbcdea0.jpg)_[with ](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/36/33/e8/3633e845dfdbb31d56e425fd3dbcdea0.jpg)[ _shorts_](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/36/33/e8/3633e845dfdbb31d56e425fd3dbcdea0.jpg), but add sandals to that mix and you have yourself a crisis. No shade to people who wear suits with shorts, but on Keith it just looked plain offensive. Keith looked pretty offended too.

"Come on, I have to brief you on some details and I have another pickup soon," Matt huffed, checking his watch yet again. His brows furrowed together, which signaled that he was running late and he looked at Keith sympathetically. Keith huffed and wrapped around the car to stand in front of Lance's open door.

"Get up," he said sternly then flinched, realizing that he wasn't supposed to be acting all alpha male towards Lance and added on. "Please."

It was an attempt, Lance could give him that. He huffed and reluctantly climbed out of the vehicle. As soon as he did, he automatically felt several pairs of eyes on him. He straightened up his posture and tried to look as professional and suave as possible. His eyes moved over the small groups of people that were standing outside the lavish building, and each one of them looked away when his gaze went over them. Good, he still got it.

He adjusted his the collar of his white button up. Pidge had decided to torture him with his least favourite type of clothing style. Velvet. His suit jacket was a deep blue colour and made entirely of velvet, the signature soft sheen of the fabric glinting in the golden lights that illuminated the drop off area. He even had on a matching velvet blue bow-tie, just like Keith with his matching tie and jacket. It's not like he didn't look good, because he did. Dare he say, [he looked quite dashing.](https://image.dhgate.com/0x0/f2/albu/g4/M00/5A/A1/rBVaEFc5MQeAJMNeAAGRPyJEDao456.jpg) The only issue was that he looked like a fucking waiter from a snobby steak restaurant.

Keith cleared his throat as a way to tell Lance to follow him and as a cover up for the snicker that threatened to come out. Lance shot him a tiny glare, but remained a look of composure and sophistication in the eyes of everyone else around them. Speaking of everyone else around them, the more he looked at them, the more he felt way out of his depth.

They were all dressed in fancy and shiny clothing that looked like it cost more than his actual house. Each and everyone one of them were frustratingly beautiful and frustratingly  _rich._ Of course they were, this was the best hotel in Kobe. The exterior alone was absolutely stunning. White marble pillars held up the roof to the roundabout drop off area, and the road was paved with little tiny cobblestones. The large glass door that led to the lobby of the hotel was framed with a shiny dark obsidian-like stone. Even the valet man was dressed well, with his dumb ass top hat (he was kidding, Mr. Valet Man, your top hat is fantastic).

"あなたのバッグを持っていけますか?" The valet man approached them and asked politely, pointing to the bags that magically appeared beside him. Lance blinked, having absolutely no idea what he said. Keith came to his rescue and replied for him.

"はい、お願いします," he said with a smile, and Lance swore that he looked like a completely different person when he smiled like that. The man bowed to them and grabbed the two black luggage bags, placing them on a cart and pushing them inside.

"What did he say?" Lance asked curiously. 

"Infer," he replied smoothly and Matt tapped them on the shoulder.

"Hey, I am running late for another pickup, so instead of telling you both one on one, I'm going to email you the current findings and details instead," he said in a rush, checking his watch again. When he saw the time he cursed silently to himself.

"I'm sure you two can handle it from here on out, so I am going to go! Call me if you're having trouble!" he called to them and with those parting words, he hopped into his car and drove away. If this new pickup was anything like theirs, he had every right to be hurrying. Lance turned towards the door and took a deep breath to gather courage. After a moment he pushed open the door and walked in with as much confidence as he could muster.

The glass door swung open and he was met with a long hallway that stretched out on both sides of him. A sign with two arrows pointing in opposite directions stood in front of them with Japanese text on it, and Lance stood there, having no clue what to do. He was suddenly glad that Keith was accompanying him (or was it that he was accompanying Keith?). Said man walked in behind him, looked at the sign for a solid two seconds, then turned to the left and started walking in that direction. Lance blindly followed. 

This place was really grand. He had to admit that. The floor was tiled with diamond shaped milky white stone and a long red carpet with intricate floral patterns stretched all the way down the middle of the hallway, leading to what he assumed was the lobby. Every two steps there was a dazzling bright chandelier hanging from the low ceiling and Lance feared that one of them would bump his head. It took every ounce of effort to not gaze in awe at everything around him. The architecture was stunning.

"[ようこそ！](https://translate.google.ca/#auto/en/%E3%82%88%E3%81%86%E3%81%93%E3%81%9D%EF%BC%81)" A cheerful voice spoke directly in front of him, and Lance nearly crashed into her small body. "[あなたはまだチェックインしましたか？](https://translate.google.ca/#ja/en/%E3%81%82%E3%81%AA%E3%81%9F%E3%81%AF%E3%81%BE%E3%81%A0%E3%83%81%E3%82%A7%E3%83%83%E3%82%AF%E3%82%A4%E3%83%B3%E3%81%97%E3%81%BE%E3%81%97%E3%81%9F%E3%81%8B%EF%BC%9F)"

"Ryan!" he called out automatically. He drilled that habit into himself, so he wouldn't accidentally forget. Keith turned around, blinking, and when he saw the small lady standing in front of him, he rushed over. 

"[申し訳ありませんが、彼は日本語を話さない,](https://translate.google.ca/#ja/en/%E7%94%B3%E3%81%97%E8%A8%B3%E3%81%82%E3%82%8A%E3%81%BE%E3%81%9B%E3%82%93%E3%81%8C%E3%80%81%E5%BD%BC%E3%81%AF%E6%97%A5%E6%9C%AC%E8%AA%9E%E3%82%92%E8%A9%B1%E3%81%95%E3%81%AA%E3%81%84%2C)" Keith said in an awkward tone. The lady nodded and laughed, saying something that sounded like an apology towards Lance and she bowed. "[チェックインはどこですか?](https://translate.google.ca/#ja/en/%E3%83%81%E3%82%A7%E3%83%83%E3%82%AF%E3%82%A4%E3%83%B3%E3%81%AF%E3%81%A9%E3%81%93%E3%81%A7%E3%81%99%E3%81%8B%3F)" 

The lady then pointed to a long desk that had several people standing behind it and Keith bowed, saying a quick thank you. At least he knew what 'thank you' was in Japanese. Keith turned towards him-and to Lance's surprise gave him a bright smile. Lance blinked.

"What?" Keith asked, his smile unwavering and he gestured with his head towards the desk. "Let's go."

"R-Right," he shook his head and followed. 

What proceeded after that was a long boring process of checking in, verifying identities, and getting informed of all the cheapest restaurants that were nearby. Come on though, if they wanted a cheap meal, would they have booked to stay in this mansion of a place? After a bit of chit-chat back and forth between the elderly lady checking them in and Keith, an interesting part caught his attention. 

"[おめでとう! あなたはお互いに結婚していますか?](https://translate.google.ca/#ja/en/%E3%81%8A%E3%82%81%E3%81%A7%E3%81%A8%E3%81%86!%20%E3%81%82%E3%81%AA%E3%81%9F%E3%81%AF%E3%81%8A%E4%BA%92%E3%81%84%E3%81%AB%E7%B5%90%E5%A9%9A%E3%81%97%E3%81%A6%E3%81%84%E3%81%BE%E3%81%99%E3%81%8B%3F)" The lady asked, a smile on her lips. The only two words Lance recognized were 'omedetō' and 'kekkon', which meant 'congratulations' and 'marriage'. Keith's face lit up a bright red and Lance watched as he fought back a stutter, replacing it with an awkward chuckle.

"[どういう意味ですか?](https://translate.google.ca/#ja/en/%E3%81%A9%E3%81%86%E3%81%84%E3%81%86%E6%84%8F%E5%91%B3%E3%81%A7%E3%81%99%E3%81%8B%3F)" he asked, fighting back the giant blush that spread over his face. Lance was so confused.

"[あなたはハネムーンスイートを予約しました!](https://translate.google.ca/#ja/en/%E3%81%82%E3%81%AA%E3%81%9F%E3%81%AF%E3%83%8F%E3%83%8D%E3%83%A0%E3%83%BC%E3%83%B3%E3%82%B9%E3%82%A4%E3%83%BC%E3%83%88%E3%82%92%E4%BA%88%E7%B4%84%E3%81%97%E3%81%BE%E3%81%97%E3%81%9F!)" she explained, turning her monitor screen around to show them a picture of their hotel room. It showed a large room with a single queen sized bed in the middle, and the whole colour scheme was a combination of red's and white's. Now, Lance was no genius and he sure as hell didn't understand Japanese, but he was pretty certain that judging by Keith's face, Allura had made it seem like they were married. Was this the secret play they wanted them to pull off? On the outside was a caring friendship between the two, but on the inside was a secret love affair? Jesus, okay, fine, have it your way Allura. 

So, Lance did the only sensible thing and put on the sexiest smirk he could pull off, "Don't be shy, there are no co-workers here!" he purred and made the risky move of slinging his arm over his shoulder. Keith's whole body stiffened, but he didn't make any moves to back away, instead leaning in with a smile.

The lady's face lit up. "Oh, I am happy for you!" she said with a very thick accent. Good enough, Lance thought, at least he could understand the language.

He leaned up to his ear and harshly whispered to him, "What are you doing?"

"Improvising," he replied back, still shooting the woman a smile. 

"So nice! When you two.. get marry?" she asked after a bit of hesitation.

"Two weeks ago," Lance replied, putting on the smooth french accent that he was instructed to have. The lady tilted her head in confusion and looked towards Keith.

"2週間前に," he translated with a sigh. 

"Do you want cake?" she offered, already typing something in. Keith quickly shook his head.

"[いいえ、いいえ、私たちは今部屋に行きます](https://translate.google.ca/#ja/en/%E3%81%84%E3%81%84%E3%81%88%E3%80%81%E3%81%84%E3%81%84%E3%81%88%E3%80%81%E7%A7%81%E3%81%9F%E3%81%A1%E3%81%AF%E4%BB%8A%E9%83%A8%E5%B1%8B%E3%81%AB%E8%A1%8C%E3%81%8D%E3%81%BE%E3%81%99)," he said with a rush and took the keys that were laying on the counter, stepping away from Lance and towards the elevators. 

"Bye bye, then!" Lance called to the old lady and she gave him a wrinkled smile and a little wave. He barely caught up to Keith in the elevator, slipping through the crack just as the door was closing.

"What the hell was that?!" Keith immediately started yelling at him. 

"I improvised! What's the big deal anyway?" he shot back with a glare. Keith sighed.

"Secret lovers play? Really? Is that what you wanted?" he hissed.

"It's what Allura wanted apparently!"

"She did not!"

"Have you seen that room? Us?" Lance gestured down to their clothes. "We might as well hold up a neon blazing sign that says _'Hey, we're gay!'"_  

"You're impossible," Keith rolled his eyes and crossed his arms over his chest. "Now you've got to reap what you sow,  _honey."_

Every word dripped with venom but Lance didn't care. Just a little bit of revenge for the other always being a royal ass. The elevator door dinged open on the 7th floor and a man walked inside. Keith took a subconscious step closer to Lance to let the man in, and when he noticed what he did, he frowned. Looks like he couldn't resist the amazing charms of  _Lancey Lance._

"[Je savais que tu m'aimais](https://translate.google.ca/#auto/en/Je%20savais%20que%20tu%20m'aimais) _,"_ he said out loud, not caring that there was another person with them. It wasn't like they understood French or anything. The man didn't even look up at them and Lance smiled. Keith flinched and smacked his arm with the back of his hand.

"[Tais-toi, idiot,](https://translate.google.ca/#auto/en/Tais-toi%2C%20idiot) _"_ he said with an annoyed huff. Lance took a tiny step closer to him, leaning down to his ear.

"[Vous n'avez pas besoin de cacher vos vrais sentiments de moi](https://translate.google.ca/#auto/en/Vous%20n'avez%20pas%20besoin%20de%20cacher%20vos%20vrais%20sentiments%20de%20moi) _,"_ he whispered and Keith swatted him away. 

"[Le seul sentiment que j'ai pour toi est la haine,](https://translate.google.ca/#auto/en/Le%20seul%20sentiment%20que%20j'ai%20pour%20toi%20est%20la%20haine) _"_ he replied and turned away from him, Lance chuckled. The door opened up to the 20th floor which seemed to be the very top and Keith and Lance stepped out. He was right, this place _was_ pretty nice. A similar red carpet from the lobby lay on the ground and the walls were covered with framed paintings of people that he didn't recognize (most of them being Japanese, of course). A golden mirror stood in front of him and Lance looked at himself in it. He looked ridiculous. Earlier, Matt forced him to slick his hair back with some gel that he had on him, making him look like some sleazy mafia boss. Which was what he was, or rather what he was supposed to be. He couldn't decide if he liked the look or not. Keith glanced at the mirror and rolled his eyes at him through the reflection, assuming that he was checking himself out. Which technically he was.

Keith shrugged and turned to walk down the hall, his eyes trained on the door at the end with the fanciest frame. By fancy, he meant that there were god damn golden laurel's attached to that thing. Lance followed after him and they stood in front of it, Keith pulling the key out from his pocket. He hesitated a moment, probably hoping that there were no more surprises that lay beyond that door. Lance felt the same way. Keith shook his head and drew in a deep breath, unlocking the door and pushing it open. 

It was big. Really big. Lance felt like he was stepping into somebody's apartment. To his right was a small kitchen with shiny black counter tops and silver appliances that reflected the bright light that turned on above them as soon as they walked in. Straight ahead was a living room area, a deep rouge velvet couch was sitting against the wall and matching lounge chairs were set around, facing a ginormous flat screen TV. Lance was about to step off the tiled entryway and onto the fluffy white carpet floors of the room, when Keith grabbed his shoulder. He scowled.

"What?" Lance huffed. 

"Take off your shoes," Keith replied blankly, pointing to the black dress shoes he had on, courtesy of none other than Matt Holt.

"Why?" he asked.

"It's a Japanese custom-or rather, an Asian custom in general," Keith explained, taking off his shoes and stepping into the room. Lance sighed and decided not to fight the power, nor be disrespectful and complied, slipping his shoes off. 

His feet hit the soft material of the carpet and he sighed in relief. That's one nice feeling carpet. You know, he expected worse from a honeymoon suite, but this really wasn't all too bad. Lance looked out the glass patio doors and saw that it was still light out. He was surprised, because he felt so exhausted and automatically assumed that it was nighttime. He also felt something else too, but it wasn't tiredness. It was more like-

"I need to take a piss," he said out loud, looking around the room for the washroom. Keith looked up from his place on the couch that he magically appeared in and pointed to the single door on the right. 

"There's a bathroom attached to the bedroom, I think," Keith said. Lance nodded and casually walked through the plain white door. He realized that he assumed everything was normal  _way_ too early. 

Inside was the most lovey dovey room that Lance had ever seen. Instead of the usual plain white walls, the bedroom was covered completely in red, with the corners of the room having interestingly placed white Greek style columns. As odd as it was, the columns were actually quite fitting. Keith was right when he said that there was a bathroom attached to the bedroom, but he failed to mention that the bathroom was  _literally a part of the bedroom_ , with absolutely no walls separating the two rooms. But the main issue here was the bed. There was only one of them. A single queen sized bed with matching silk covers that were the same colour as the walls and the couches outside. The fact that bed frame was in the shape of a heart just pissed him off that much more. 

"You're shitting me," Keith spoke from behind him. "I mean, what did we expect? We're married, remember?"

"God dammit," was all that Lance could really say at the moment. He had  _just_ got over his weird captivation with the man, and now he had to sleep in the same bed as him. Lance could handle empty flirting, but not this. 

Keith walked into the bathroom, which only took two steps, and he groaned. Lance saw what he was looking at and he groaned as well. There was no shower, only a bathtub. What kind of hotel room didn't have a shower? Honeymoon suite or not, this was bullshit. The bathtub was, of course, in the shape of a heart as well and rose petals floated in the water that was oddly already filled. Were they expecting them to immediately get in the tub and fuck or something? This was going terribly.

Lance fell face first onto the bed and groaned. It was amazingly comfy and soft, but he couldn't focus on that right now. All he could think was,  _'Why me?'_ He felt the bed shift beside him, but didn't bother to look up. Keith opened his mouth to say something, but then decided otherwise and closed it again. 

Lance sighed. "Say it," he mumbled into the smooth covers. 

"I don't really care that much, to be honest." 

That got Lance sitting up. "About what?" Keith gestured around the room at nothing in particular, yet Lance was able to understand what he was talking about perfectly. 

"Oh," Lance said, unable to think of anything to say. If he had to be honest he didn't care that much either. Just two dudes on a mission doing mission things, like murdering gang members, pretending to be married, sleeping in the same bed. That's totally normal, right? 

"I can go to the couch if you want, though!" Keith stuttered out, sounding very out of character. Normally he wouldn't give a damn about Lance's feelings or opinions.

"No, it's okay, I don't care either," he shrugged and properly sat up, swinging his feet over the side of the bed. They sat their in silence, both leaving the other to their own personal thoughts for a moment. Lance imagined that Keith was brainstorming ways to cut down his enemies, or something. Usual Keith things. Lance was the first one to speak up. 

"So, wasn't Matt supposed to send us an email update on new information?" he asked. 

"Who knows, he might be dead," Keith said nonchalantly with a shrug. On cue, a  _ding!_ noise cut through the air and Keith fished his phone out of his pocket. He took it out and opened the email that Matt had sent. So he wasn't dead, which was good news. 

"Let's see," Lance hummed and peered over his shoulder at the screen. "Blah blah, Lotor is progressing, blah blah, locations that I can't understand because the Japanese language eludes me, blah blah, new club opening tonight that has information about a drug?"

Lance ended off that last bit as a question more than a statement. New club? Information? Drugs? That's a new one.

"The Galra are making a drug?" Keith squinted at the words on the screen. "They're not really known for doing that kind of thing."

"I guess they are now. And this new club/gambling hall from the Dragons just opened in...  _Kay-bookee-cho_ _?"_   Lance asked, completely butchering the name. He really didn't know how to speak Japanese.

"Kabukicho," Keith said, pronouncing it correctly for him. "That's the biggest red light district in Japan, maybe even all of Asia."

Lance hummed and read through the details. The Dragons were opening up another club and there were rumours that they developed a new party drug and are introducing it to the public through the grand opening of that club. Lots of people would be there, including the Galra so it would be a good place to start gathering information. 

Keith typed out a quick message to Matt, asking for the exact location and within a minute he already replied. He opened it up in a special map application made by Pidge and stared at the red blinking dot, indicating that's where it was. It was right in the middle of the district where alot of gangs hung around. They would have to be careful there. 

"So," Lance said, shooting a finger gun towards the phone. "How would you like to go clubbing tonight?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i probably should have, but I didn't bother to add most of the translations because i made it pretty easy to guess what they were saying, judging by the character's actions etc. if you want me to add translations then I can totally do that next chapter, just tell me in the comments/on my tumblr. 
> 
> Speaking of that, follow me on [tumblr](http://arisushanti.tumblr.com/) so you can tell me how badly this makes you want to die (or even send me your fanart for this au oh dear god please do that) also follow me on [instagram](https://www.instagram.com/arisushxnti/) !
> 
> i made an inspo playlist based off this fic, you can listen to it on spotify [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/omgitsreynaa/playlist/4VUPrPU9xlMItnQUQCNF0F?si=qyDRQd9jTXOY-WpPiZBAhQ)


	7. Ivory Bar and Club

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the two boys venture around the city and encounter a surprise at the end of it all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yeah so i had some pretty bad writers block as i was trying to write those last few scenes, sorry about that. after this, i'll try to keep a steady update schedule like i promised. dont quote me on that though.

_"What do you mean it's a five hour drive from Kobe to Tokyo?!"_  Lance shrieked, staring at Keith with wide eyes. The man shook his head and sat down on the couch.

"Most of the areas we were supposed to search are in Kobe, so that's why we are staying here," he sighed, and ran a hand through his hair. "I didn't think we would be going to Tokyo alot."

"Well, what are we going to do now?" Lance asked with a frown and plopped down in the lounge chair next to his couch. He was sick of long hours spent in vehicles trying to get to places. He looked up at the blank TV and decided to see what was on the news, reaching over to the little coffee table to grab the remote, turning it on. The TV lit up and the channel was already on the news, a lady on screen was reading out the current story. Lance watched it for a single second until he realized that he still couldn't speak Japanese. God, this was so annoying. He changed the channel in frustration and it landed on a random reality show.

"We could take the bullet train," Keith suggested, watching the people on screen have an argument over what snacks to buy. Lance looked at him and tilted his head to the side.

"What's that?" he asked.

"Did you even bother to search up anything about this country?"

"Shut up."

Keith rolled his eyes. "It's this really fast train that can take you from one end of Japan to the other in only 2 hours," he explained.

"How much is it?"

"About $140 US per ticket."

"Jesus," Lance whistled lowly. 

"It's not like we can't afford it," Keith let out a little huff of breath, that Lance suspected was his version of a laugh. 

"That's true," he commented and got up from his seat, moving over to the kitchen. He was totally exhausted from the events that had happened and definitely needed some sort of way to wake himself up. Considering they were going to be going to that new club, he was probably going to be staying up past his bedtime tonight. He grabbed a kettle that sat in the corner of the counter and filled it up with water, plugging it in so it would boil. He opened up the pristine white cupboards to try and find some form of coffee beans or instant coffee powder. He looked through every cupboard to no avail, and sighed. Keith looked up from his spot on the couch and raised an eyebrow

"What do you want?" he asked, and Lance frowned.

"I just want some coffee, for God's sake," he said and began to look through the empty cupboards again, even though he knew there was nothing in them. Keith walked over to a line of shelves that were beside the TV and pulled out several small square packets in white plastic wrap. He made his way towards Lance and Lance's eyes widened in shock.

"Are those condoms?!" Lance asked in horror, grabbing a random mug on the counter and holding it in front of him as a weapon. Keith rolled his eyes and grabbed it out of his hand, putting it on the counter and ripping open the packet. In his hand was a sort of little paper cup with black powder inside, and he folded open two white handles and hooked them onto the sides of the mug so the cup bit was hanging in the middle of the mug.

"What the hell is that?" Lance asked, peering over his shoulder.

"It's instant coffee," he said, grabbing the kettle which had a light bubbling sound coming from it. Very carefully and tenderly, he poured the water into the paper cup and, sure enough, a black liquid slowly dripped into the mug. 

"That's weird," Lance commented with a shrug, taking in the rich smell that began to fill the air. Whatever, it didn't matter to him how it was conceived as long as it was drinkable, and it could wake him up.

"You're weird," Keith murmured in response, setting down the kettle and throwing the used coffee grinds into a nearby garbage can. Lance grabbed the mug from the counter and brought it to his lips, about to take a sip until suddenly Keith's hand swooped out and nearly knocked the thing out of his hand.

"What the hell are you doing?" Lance yelled, fumbling to keep his grip on the mug handle again. He steadied the cup in his hands and glared at Keith.

"What are  _you_ doing?" he shot back, gesturing to the drink.

"Trying to drink my coffee in peace?"

"There's no milk or sugar in it?"

"So?"

"It's black!"

"And?"

"You can't just drink it straight like that."

"Watch me, Mullet," Lance stuck his tongue out at him and took a hearty swig from it just to spite him, and regret instantly set in. He forgot that it was just made two minutes ago and was absolutely scorching hot. That was a mistake. Lance darted towards the sink, fanning his swelling tongue and stuck it under the sink, blasting on the cold water. He let out a sigh of relief as the flowing water hit his tongue, just as he heard a knock on the door. God, he hoped that his tongue wasn't burnt, that would be embarrassing.

"This wouldn't have happened if you put cream in it," Keith snickered and walked towards the front door, opening it. Lance heard him have a little exchange to the person at the door, then close it, rolling two suitcases in tow. "Now hurry up, I want to get a headstart on this new lead."

"Whatever!" Lance murmured and walked up to him, snatching the suitcase to go change. Plus, by the time he was done his drink would probably have cooled down by then.

* * *

 

To those who were wondering, yes, he got to finish his coffee after he made another quick wardrobe change. Thankfully, without much more debate from his partner. The two stood outside in much more standard casual suits and were trying to wave over a cab in the busy streets. The sun was already beginning to set, giving off a warm orange glow to the scene. Lance checked his watch on his wrist (he owns a watch because he's fancy and professional). It was 8:30pm, so they'd arrive in Tokyo at around 11:00pm. Perfect timing, since the club was supposed to be opening at around midnight. They would be able to use the opportunity to scope out the area and see if they can make some early connections with people and places. Now, if they could just get a damn ride. 

"Hey, what's taking so long?" Lance snapped impatiently, tapping his foot rhythmically. Keith sighed.

"Maybe if you didn't look like such a douche, then this would be much easier," he replied, scanning the jammed street for any available taxi's, an issue that came with getting the most expensive hotel in the city that happened to be near a harbor. Not much complaints though because the view from their room of the sun reflecting off the water was beautiful. Blinding, yet beautiful nonetheless. 

"You're wearing almost the same thing as me," Lance said, pointing to his normal black suit jacket and black jeans. 

"Yeah, but yours is in blue and your hair looks like it came straight off the head of a 1920's mobster," he deadpanned and Lance almost saw a smile on his face when a black car finally pulled in. Like the wonderful gentleman he was, Keith opened the door for him and waved a hand in, giving Lance an obnoxious bow. He glared.

"First of all, most of those guys didn't even have hair-," Lance cut himself off to step into the car, Keith following behind him to shut the door. 

"[どこに行きたい？](https://translate.google.ca/#ja/en/%E3%81%A9%E3%81%93%E3%81%AB%E8%A1%8C%E3%81%8D%E3%81%9F%E3%81%84%EF%BC%9F)" The driver asked with a smile. Lance blinked, just realizing that there was another human being in the car. He was really off his game right now.

"[最寄りの新幹線駅](https://translate.google.ca/#ja/en/%E6%9C%80%E5%AF%84%E3%82%8A%E3%81%AE%E6%96%B0%E5%B9%B9%E7%B7%9A%E9%A7%85)," Keith replied and the driver nodded, pulling into the street again. 

Lance looked out the window and watched all the cars zoom past at a staggering 10 mph. The ironic stillness of such a crowded place left a weird feeling in his stomach. He was never used to big cities and lots of people, despite the fact that his main skillsets were focused on the two things. All he could think about whenever he was in situations like these was his old house with all his siblings. There were always people around, but it wasn't like how it was now. It was a quiet noise, a peaceful crowd that was familiar and sweet. Now that he thought about it, he hasn't visited home in quite a long time. Mateo would be 15 by now and in highschool. That was a terrifying thought. He hoped that Kaltenecker was doing okay, all the other cows were so feisty. He always avoided thinking of his home and family, it left a nostalgic feeling in his chest. Not that it was a bad thing, it was just a distraction and he couldn't afford distractions. Lance barely noticed that there car was moving until they finally stopped at the station. 

Keith said a thank you to the driver and handed him a couple of coins, which the man accepted gratefully. He stepped out of the car and opened it up wide for Lance, staring down at him. "Are you coming?"

"Yes, I am," he said, shaking himself out of his thoughts and climbed out. The taxi sped off, and the two stood in front of a nice white building that looked like a mini airport. 

"Let me do all the talking," Keith said in his usual monotone and started to walk towards the doors. Lance scoffed.

"It's not like I'd be able to anyways," he rolled his eyes. Keith's body stiffened, as if he just remembered that, but kept moving and Lance had to stifle a laugh. God, this guy. 

The inside of the building was not what he expected. First of all, he initially thought that there would be a lot of people at the station, but that wasn't the case. The lines to buy tickets on his right were only filled up halfway, and directly to his left was a little cafe with a few businessmen typing away at their computers. So, the two went through the usual business of getting in line, Keith buying them tickets, Lance having no idea what the hell anyone was saying. When they arrived at the platform they had made it just in time and the train was just pulling in. It looked like a normal train except the nose of it was angled to resemble a plane to reduce wind resistance. 

Lance let out a low whistle, "Damn, that looks cool." He admired the shiny white exterior of the train. 

"You should see it when it's actually moving," Keith said and stepped on board, Lance following right behind him. They grabbed two seats that were facing each other and Lance glanced out the window as the whole thing began to move. Slowly at first, they passed by lines and line of small houses until the speed picked up and all he could see were fields. 

Keith was right, this thing was fast. He heard it could go up to about 300km/h. That's really fast. He tried to focus on the little details that he could see outside, but they were going so quick that he began to get dizzy. The sun was only barely peaking over the horizon causing the sky to be tinted a dark orange and pink colour. His whole world felt like it was in a time lapse, and it was getting hard to resist getting swept up in the crashing ocean of his thoughts, which always came to him whenever everything around him wouldn't slow down. He had a bad habit of getting lost in his thoughts, and most of the time they weren't good for him.

A hurricane of words flew around in his brain as he stared out at the sun that disappeared behind the horizon. It was happening again. His fingers gripped the armrests of his chair, turning white. Images flashed in his mind and that was when the ringing began to return. He dug his nail into his palm to try to make the thoughts stop so the noise would stop, to no avail. He bit down on his lip and grimaced. 

"Hey," A voice spoke, pulling him out of his trance, the loud high pitched tone in his ears stopping. Lance's eyes fluttered a bit as he tried to focus them on the person in front of. Keith's eyebrows were knitted together in concern and it looked like he wanted to say something. He shook his head.

"Sorry, I was just.. thinking about stuff," Lance shrugged and put on his best smile. Keith didn't seem to buy it, but let it go anyways. 

"Well, whatever it was don't think about it again," he said with a bit of humour in his voice. "You looked like you wanted to shit yourself and cry at the same time."

"I was imagining what you would be like in bed-," Why was he saying? "-and the thought was so horrendous that I almost puked."

"I think that's your stomach rejecting your shitty choice of how you have your coffee," he replied in a beat and Lance felt the train began to slow down. Has it seriously been 2 hours already? 

Lance frowned, "Hey I thought we agreed that you wouldn't comment on that anymore."

"And I thought we agreed that you would stop commenting about my sex life," he shot back and the train lurched forward to a halt. 

"I never said anything about that!" He hadn't.

"Are we seriously going to debate over it?" Keith sighed and got up from his seat, making his way towards the opening door that had just slid open. Lance followed him and the two were instantly swept up in a sea of moving people. Instinctively, his hand reached out to grab Keith's shoulder and he felt the man tense up underneath him. 

They followed the movement of the crowd and Lance managed to just get a glimpse of a sign above his head. In small print under the original Japanese text read  _'Shinjuku'_. It was safe to say that's where they were. Before he knew it, the crowd had spat them out outside of the station and he was standing on a sidewalk. Keith glanced up at him briefly, and Lance read the subtle signal, quickly removing his hand from his shoulder. 

"It's about a ten minute walk from here to Kabukicho, so we have time to look around before the club opens," Keith informed, turning around to face Lance but he wasn't paying attention to anything he had said. He had looked up.

Lights. So many bright and luminous signs hung from practically each structure that was standing. Buildings of every shape and size stood in jumbled rows with wide streets that were filled to the brim with bustling people. An intersection was directly in front of him with cars were speeding by, the metal coats of each one reflecting the gleam of all the multi-colored signs above. The traffic light turned red and a whole wave of pedestrians began to cross. They were moving towards them and that was when Keith pulled Lance out of his daze, and out of their way.

"Wake up, Lacroix," Keith spoke with a careful voice and dragged him out of the way of the doors. Lance blinked and adjusted his eyes to look at him. Right, he had to focus and be careful here. There were alot of people around, and who knew if one of them could be Galra

" _Désolé,_ I got distracted," Lance shook his head. "This place is just so-..."

"Overwhelming?" Keith finished his sentence for him and Lance nodded sheepishly. 

"I'm not used to this kind of scene,” he said with a shrug. Keith hummed curiously in response, but didn’t press. Instead he put a gentle hand to the small of Lance's back and nudged him along. Lance blinked in confusion, but let the man guide him down the sidewalk. 

"What are you doing?" he asked, sidestepping to avoid bumping into the people around him. Keith didn't respond and he guessed that his voice was drowned out from all the chatter and music around him.

It was seriously a lively place, a different kind of lively than what he was familiar with. More people, more lights, more sound. He could feel every pair of eyes that glanced at him, and he couldn't decide whether he liked it or not. It was obvious to everyone that he was a foreigner with his looks and height. He wasn't super tall or anything, but when the average height for an adult male was 5'7" then he expected to be getting some raised eyebrows at his 6'1" stance. Although, an added bonus was being able to look over everyone's heads with ease to admire the view. 

At some point in time, Keith had removed his hand from Lance's back and watched him from behind as the other picked up his stride to admire the place. One thing he had to comment on was the fact that everything was so clean. They've been there for not even a day and he hadn't seen one speck of garbage on the ground. There were the occasional water bottles that were placed against the wall of some buildings in a neat and orderly line, but they seemed too purposely placed there for it to count as litter. He was partially confused why the Japanese put filled water bottles outside their apartment complex's, but he decided to ask Keith about that later. 

The longer they kept walking, the darker the area got and the amount of people began to steadily increase. Lance knew enough about the world to know that they were getting close to their destination. People loved shady places, it gives you this sort of thrill while you're in it. He walked for another minute or so, until Keith's hand reached out to stop him. 

"We're here," he said pointing to the right and Lance followed his finger up. A small bright sign had something written in Japanese, while two red lit up strips curved in opposite directions to make an ellipse that surrounded the sign. The street was considerably more narrow than the others he saw and it was also considerably more filled with people as well. Also, it was loud. 

Lance chuckled nervously as he gazed out at the crowd. "After you?" he asked, turning towards Keith with a smile. All he got was a sigh and a small glare.

"Fine," Keith murmured and walked ahead of him into the sea of people, Lance following behind him like how a dog would follow their owner. This was where the benefit of being taller than everyone came into play. He looked around at the buildings at the side. Employees stood outside of each one, waving menus in people's faces with some trying to drag tourists in. Lance pursed his lips together and stuck a little closer to Keith. He had no idea why he did that, it wasn't like he couldn't handle a bit of roughhousing from tipsy old managers. 

They passed by one bar where all the furniture was completely covered in mini rhinestone-like lights, and the waitresses were in nothing but their underwear. Lance averted his eyes like the respectful man that he was, and picked up his pace to avoid being around their for too long. 

Suddenly, a hand reached out and grabbed Keith, pulling him into a club. A switch flipped inside him and his head swiveled around, automatically chopping whoever was holding onto him in the throat. The man grabbed his throat and gagged, letting go of Keith's wrist while Lance pulled the other back in towards him. Keith blinked up at him, disoriented from being yanked back and forth in such a quick amount of time. 

Before either could stop him Lance yelled in the guy's face, "[この野郎!](https://translate.google.ca/#ja/en/%E3%81%93%E3%81%AE%E9%87%8E%E9%83%8E!)" 

Heads turned towards them, but Lance didn't care and strutted off with his partner in tow. "Are you okay?"

"What just happened?" Keith asked, sounding dazed and mildly impressed with his correct pronunciation of the curse. "And where did you learn to say that?"

"Er, heard it once and assumed it was offensive," Lance cleared his throat, averting his gaze. He would never admit to him that he saw it once in an anime and practiced saying it in the shower. 

"I see, thanks..." he trailed off after adding the gratitude piece at the end. Lance smirked.

"[Pas de probleme, mon amour,](https://translate.google.ca/#en/fr/No%20problem%2C%20my%20love!) _"_ he gave him a wink and Keith groaned. 

"[Arrêtez](https://translate.google.ca/#fr/en/Arr%C3%AAtez)," he grunted out and Lance laughed at how fussy he became. For the rest of the way they walked side by side instead of one in front of the other. It was decided that it was much safer that way. After a couple minutes of more walking, Keith held a hand out in front of him for them to stop. 

"Down there," he said and used the hand that was in front of Lance to point to their right. Lance turned his head and was surprised to see that there was a small alleyway in between two buildings that he didn't even notice. It looked like the path you'd take to go to a sketchy club, which meant that was probably where they needed to go. 

Reluctantly, he turned and began to walk down the alley with Keith close behind him. The path was much more narrow than he expected, his shoulders barely brushing against the walls of the bordering buildings that surrounded them. It was dark and as they ventured further on the path, the bright lights behind them faded away. The only reason that Lance was able to discern where he was going was because of the deep purple glow that shone from the end of the path. After ducking under a couple of protruding pipes and jumping over a puddle of questionable liquid, the two finally exited the claustrophobic trail.

Lance looked around and expected to see some dark and scary looking club with equally dark and scary bouncers in front of it, but there was none. They were standing in front of a small mundane looking bar, still in the Kabukicho District. 

"This is it," Keith said. The sign above the bar read 'Ivory' in bold purple letters. He was right, this was supposed to be the place. 

"Uh, are you sure?" Lance asked, gesturing towards the window where they could both see about a dozen old men sitting at the bar. He was pretty sure that Matt mentioned in the email that this place was going to be extremely dangerous. So why did it look like the inside of a nursing home?

"Just shut up and trust me," he huffed and swung open the glass doors, walking straight in with Lance slipping in behind him. Somehow the place smelled exactly how it looked, like cigarette smoke and cheap beer. 

"What can I get you, young men?" The bartender called loudly and waved them over, Keith approaching him warily, taking his phone out of his hand. 

"This is a nice bar, is this made of ebony?" he asked smoothly and slipped onto one of the stools with Lance watching the exchange while standing. The bartender narrowed his eyes for a split second, then returned back to his casual aloof expression.

"Yes it is," he replied and returned to wiping some glasses with a white cloth. Keith brought his phone out of his pocket and opened it up.

"[特別飲み物はありますか?](https://translate.google.ca/#ja/en/%E7%89%B9%E5%88%A5%E9%A3%B2%E3%81%BF%E7%89%A9%E3%81%AF%E3%81%82%E3%82%8A%E3%81%BE%E3%81%99%E3%81%8B%3F)" he used his head to gesture to the back where a door was leading to what he assumed was a kitchen. 

"[なんでしょう?](https://translate.google.ca/#ja/en/%E3%81%AA%E3%82%93%E3%81%A7%E3%81%97%E3%82%87%E3%81%86%3F)" The man asked with a smug look. Lance glanced down at Keith's phone and he had open a picture that had a familiar purple insignia on it. 

" _Vrepit Sangria_ ," Keith said and flipped the screen around to show him. At this point Lance wanted to face-palm so badly, because that was probably the worst code to a secret club that he had ever heard. Like, seriously, why a pun? The bartender looked at the Galran symbol for a single second, then turned around to unlock the door behind him. The two followed him through the door and they were, unsurprisingly, standing in a kitchen as Lance had predicted. 

The man moved all the way to the back of the kitchen and stood in front of a very intimidating metal door that looked like the door to a freezer. He unlocked it with another key on his chain and slowly pushed it open, a loud creak resonating. That was when the faint thump of a heavy bass hit his ears. He peered past him and saw a dark descending staircase that he couldn't see the end of. 

"Here it is, have fun," The old bartender said darkly and pushed them onto the landing, slamming the door behind them. Lance flinched as the last bit of fresh air was cut off and all he could smell was the thick scent of sweat and unending amounts of liquor. They were definitely in the right place.

"Come on, let's go," Keith grumbled and reluctantly began his descent down the narrow stairs. 

After somehow not tripping down the stairs, the two approached a single door with a dim neon purple sign with the words  _'Ivory Club'_ in English cursive. Lance looked at Keith and shrugged, giving the door a swift knock. A hollow metallic sound rang out that was instantly drowned out by the constant 808 bass on the other side of the door. A couple seconds passed and the door opened up, and the first thing that Lance registered was the flashing multicoloured strobe lights. 

Immediately, his ears were hit with the loud and stereotypical house music that you would normally hear in a club. A thick musky scent that he couldn't quite place reached his nose, and he cringed a bit. All he could see were silhouettes of people crowding the dance floor and moving around, the multitude of flashing lights making it hard to really identify anyone. 

Lance stepped through the door hesitantly to get a better look of the whole scene. He could feel Keith's and many others' eyes on him and immediately straightened up his posture. Keith appeared beside him and put a hand on his shoulder, nudging him to walk forward. With a minimal flinch he did, but didn't get very far when a smooth voice stopped him right in his tracks.

 _"How rare it is to see an unfamiliar face in my establishment,_ " The man had an English accent and spoke with such prowess that it was as if everything else went quiet when he opened his mouth.

Lance whipped his head around and was met with a pair of staggering purple eyes that seemed like they were glowing in the dimly lit corner of the room. Keith's grip tightened on his shoulder and Lance could feel how tense he was.

 _"Let us get acquainted, then."_ He gave a small nod and Lance took in his long silvery hair that swayed with his movements. He wanted to say something in return, but his throat felt uncharacteristically dry at that moment. 

_"I am Lotor, and who might you be?"_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey, i have no idea how sketchy underground black market type shit works but i bet neither do y'all, so let's just pretend. also don't ask about that little coffee dispute at the start of the chapter, it just went in that direction and I decided to go with it. 
> 
> ALSO I HOPE YOU LIKED MY VREPIT SA PUN WITH SANGRIA, BECAUSE IM CACKLING OVER HERE BECAUSE IM SO FUNNY
> 
> hope you enjoyed the chapter, and if you did you should totally share it with all your fellow klance loving friends.
> 
> follow me on [tumblr](http://arisushanti.tumblr.com/) for news on chapter updates and also follow me on [instagram](https://www.instagram.com/arisushxnti/) !
> 
> i made an inspo playlist based off this fic, you can listen to it on spotify [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/omgitsreynaa/playlist/4VUPrPU9xlMItnQUQCNF0F?si=qyDRQd9jTXOY-WpPiZBAhQ)


	8. Neon Strobe Lights

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the party don't start till they walk in

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> shittiest string of weeks ever, but at least the new chapter is out finally.

Would it be bad if Lance said that this man was absolutely gorgeous?

Instantly, he regained his composure and put on his well-practiced act and accent before answering the question that had just been asked. "My name is Christian Lacroix." 

Lance stuck his hand out for him to shake and he grabbed it firmly. Lotor looked him up and down, his eyes taking in every single detail he could take note upon. Honestly, Lance couldn't tell if this was him checking him out or trying to find any weapons on him. Even if he did decide to search him, no one would find anything suspicious. He took the liberty of bringing some discreet weapons like his pen that doubles as a small knife and the ring he was wearing that can send an electric shock through a person's body once contact has been made. Lotor seemed to be satisfied with whatever eye-search he conducted, and let go of his hand.

"Who is your little friend behind you?" Lotor asked, peering over his shoulder at who Lance assumed was Keith. He didn't even need to turn around to know that Keith was already scowling, he hated it when people commented on his height. With a little nudge in the stomach with his elbow, Keith spoke up.

"I'm Ryan, nice to meet you, sir!" he stepped forward and held his hand out for the other to shake. For a moment, something flashed in Lotor's eyes that Lance couldn't discern, then it was gone again. He shook Keith's hand with a twinge of reluctance.

"I've heard of your name before. You are from that group in France, yes? What was it called again?" Lotor asked and practically completely dismissed Keith's existence again. Even though Keith showed no signs of it, Lance could tell he was getting annoyed with this guy's pompous attitude.

" _Lame de Marmora."_

"And you yourself are French?"

"I am," Lance laughed and narrowed his eyes. "Does that come as a surprise to you?"

"Not really, you fit the bill quite nicely," Lotor mused, his deep eyes staring intensely at him. Lance couldn't tell if he was flirting or not, but either way he wasn't going to give up the chance to get some information. Although, that was probably a huge mistake since this was the most dangerous man in the country he was dealing with here. 

"Congratulations on your new business," Lance commented casually, a sly smile playing on his lips. 

"Well, it is not mine _per se_ , but I am an investor," the man explained and used a lazy hand to gesture around the place. He was about to press on and lead into something deeper, when a small tap on his shoulder had Lance turning around. Keith looked up at him, lips pursed and expression steeled.

"I'm going to get a drink, what do you _want?"_  He put this weird sort of emphasis on the word 'want' that Lance didn't understand. He opened his mouth to respond, but was cut off once more. 

"There is no need for that, I'll be happy to buy you two something," Lotor offered, careful eyes watching them. Lance decided that he wasn't one to turn down free drinks, so he gave him a gracious nod and watched him walk past them.

"He doesn't seem that bad- _OW!"_ Lance cried out as he received a hard punch to the shoulder. He shot Keith a glare and was met with a similar response.

"What the hell are you doing?" He hissed, grabbing his arm and pulling him more to the side.

"I could be asking you the same thing!" Lance yanked his arm free of his partner's grip. Keith pressed his lips together in a firm line.

"That was Lotor, we were never supposed to come in contact with him at all during this mission!"

"So? Everything will be fine, our covers are airtight," Lance replied. Usually Keith would be the one who would jump into things without a plan, so hearing him be so against it was strange. Then again, maybe he finally learned a thing or two. 

"This was not part of the plan," Keith stated firmly, jabbing a finger into his chest. 

"Oh yeah? And what was the 'plan'," Lance scoffed, and swatted Keith's hand away from him with the roll of his eyes. The other did not seem to like that and he narrowed his eyes.

"Get in, gather intel, get out," he said lowly, just in case someone was listening.

"Yeah, and that's what I'm doing right now, so shut up!" With a huff, Lance turned back around just in time for Lotor to stroll up to them again. A man in a black suit followed closely behind him, a silver tray in his hand that carried three wine glasses. Lotor stopped in front of Lance and made a small wave of his hand, the server stepping forward and handing him his drink.

"You looked like a wine person," he said smoothly and grabbed a glass off the tray for himself. Keith took the liberty of taking a glass as well, and sipped it tentatively. His eyes widened a bit, and he took another eager sip. Lance decided to give it a taste as well, and was surprised to find himself actually liking it. He wasn't too fond of red wine, but he could get into this.

"This is good," he turned towards him and complimented his choices. 

Lotor looked pleased with the response and gave a simple nod, "I am glad, now why don't you and I have a chat somewhere so we can get acquainted?"

"Don't you mean 'we'-...?" Lance began to ask, but trailed off when he looked around and realized that Keith was nowhere to be found, along with the server who had been carrying the drinks. That didn't seem too good. 

 _"Come with me, Mr. Lacroix."_ There it was again. That smooth and rich voice, compelling him to follow. He resisted a shiver, and gave him a nod, trying to hide his reluctance with a smile. Wherever Keith was, he was sure that he could handle it, hopefully. Who knows, maybe he went to go punch a wall or whatever Keith did to release anger. 

Lotor led him through the dance floor, carefully weaving around the sweaty bodies that jumped around to the heavy bass of the music. Now that he had properly stepped inside the room, he had to admit that it was much more tame than he expected. Well, as tame a nightclub full of mafia members could be. At least there wasn't anyone getting murdered. As they reached about the middle of the floor-honestly, he couldn't tell where they were anymore, the place was so hectic- Lotor turned around briefly and his mouth moved, but he couldn't hear what he said. Lance assumed that he was talking to him.

 _"Pardon?"_ he asked, making sure his pronunciation was perfect and clear. Lotor stopped fully and leaned in closely to his ear, placing a careful hand lightly on the small of Lance's back.

 _"So, what do you think?"_ His hot breath tickled Lance's ear and he resisted a shiver that came over him. Damn, this guy was good at making things mildly sexual.

"Of what?" Lance asked, doing his best to hide his discomfort. Lotor let out a deep chuckle and moved away from him, giving Lance the chance to finally let out the breath he didn't know he was holding. 

"The place, since you and I have yet to properly speak, you are not biased in your opinions on my establishment." He gestured around at the room, and Lance's eyes followed them. Somehow, even though they were standing in the middle of dance party, everyone else made room for them and left a small circle of space. It looked as if someone had put a bubble around them.

"I thought you said this wasn't yours," Lance recalled and Lotor smiled, his eyes narrowing slightly. 

"It's not exactly mine, _but I still own the place_ ," he said in a strange tone that could only be described as dark. Lance was having alot of trouble reading this guy, and that wasn't good. He let out a small chuckle and continued forward, breaking through the crowd to emerge on the other side of the room.

Once Lance was not surrounded by tons of drunk people dancing, the place wasn't so bad. He definitely liked this side of the room better. Moving slightly away from the flashing lights, there were classic looking tables with people sitting and having drinks. Along the wall were private booths where you could close the door to and hide yourself from the rest of the population. Lotor began walking towards the only one of the private rooms available, which happened to be the largest one. 

He stepped up onto the slightly raised platform that it stood on, and casually walked into the room. Lance glanced behind him at the rest of the club and scanned it quickly to see if he can get a tiny glimpse of mullet. Nothing. With a deep breath, he stepped into the room.

"Sit down, Mr. Lacroix," Lotor said, gesturing to the chair next to him. The rooms walls were covered in different abstract paintings and a small table stood in the middle of the room. Lance shoved the uneasy that rose up in his throat down and complied. Lotor gave him a good up and down look, assessing him.

"Ah, what is it you wanted to talk about?" Lance made sure his voice was steady and confident. This would be a bad time to be showing any weakness right now. Lotor seemed to appreciate the small act of bravado and cleared his throat. 

"I wanted to know how I have never come to meet the leader of the most notorious gang in Paris," he replied. 

"Well, you just said the reason."

"I don't think I understand what you mean," Lotor tilted his head to the side in confusion. 

"Eh, because, how you say?" Lance pretended to struggle to translate his thoughts into English. "I am in Paris, you work in America,  _oui?"_

"Yes, indeed," he nodded. "Who was that little man with you?"

Lance snorted at his description of Keith. "He is my partner."

"What kind?" His voice was suggestive, and his eyebrows went up ever so slightly in peaked interest. 

Lance hesitated before responding, "Business."

"Is that all?" 

Lance chuckled, and leaned back a bit in his seat. It seemed that Lotor had already caught on to their little fake secret. That was fairly quick. "He is also my husband."

As soon as the sentence left his mouth, Lance instantly regretted it and turned red. It was supposed to be a secret for a reason. Even if it wasn't actually true, he should not have said that. Now he knows that Keith was supposedly valuable to him and that knowledge could be used against him. Well, now that he thought about it, Keith wasn't  _supposedly_ valuable he _was_ valuable. Them being partners and all. Lance silently prepared himself for whatever threats Lotor was about to throw at him, but was surprised when none came. Instead, he laughed.

"Goodness, that was not what I was expecting." The man wiped a nonexistent tear from his eye from the laughter. "I was simply kidding, I didn't actually think that-"

"We were gay?" Lance cut him off with a sly smile. Well, he knew that he was bi, but Keith's sexuality was still in question. For all he knew he could be straight, and Lance would have to suffer. In reflection though, no straight man would wear fingerless gloves outside of the context of motorcycles, and unironically for that matter.

Lotor continued "I mean no offence by that, after all we will be partners as well." 

Lance blinked at his response. Now he seriously couldn't tell if that was flirting or not. 

 _"Quoi?"_ He asked hesitantly. 

"I have a deal to propose, if you are interested."

Lance's mouth nearly dropped open. Was this guy serious? They met like what, ten minutes ago? This had to be some sort of trap, or maybe he was just an idiot. The latter seemed pretty unlikely, so Lance steeled himself for whatever was to come. 

"Let me hear it," he said confidently and added a little smirk for good measure. Lotor leaned back in his chair and gazed at him, a dark expression on his face.

"Two agents from the Altea Intelligence Agency were said to have arrived in the country mere hours ago-"

_Oh shit, he was dead for sure._

"-and I heard that you have a few people people working on the inside."

_Wait, what? He wasn't dead?_

"Do you see what I'm getting at?"

_Fuck, he asked a question. Quick, respond!_

Lance nodded his head and chuckled, "A few? That is an understatement."

"Very good, in exchange for some intel I am willing to grant you whatever you desire," Lotor smiled and picked up his drink by the rim of the glass, taking a sip.

"Whatever I desire? You speak like  _le diable_ ," Lance scratched his chin in thought. He could get whatever he wanted from this guy. In theory. Maybe he could flat out ask for the weapon blueprints. Although that was tempting, it would probably get him caught instantly. There were so many things that he could possibly ask for. The drugs, weapons, information. The only problem is that all of them would make him look like a spy. There was only one option that gave Keith and him a perfect oppurtunity to conduct their mission. The only issue is that they would have to do some serious plan hatching to pull it off perfectly, and Lance hated excessive planning.

"I will attend the party you are having," he said finally. Lotor seemed intrigued with that response, as his eyebrows rose a tiny bit, just enough for Lance to catch. He guessed that Lotor wasn't expecting him to say that.

"Party is such ludicrous term to refer to it as. Something with such grandeur can only be described as a gala," Lotor scoffed and set down his drink, his long hair swaying behind him. Jesus, he was such a prick. Lance simply smiled.

"I do not know what those words mean, but I take that you accept?"

"Of course," Lotor stood up and held out his hand from across the table. Lance followed his actions and grabbed his hand firmly, shaking it.

"We have ourselves a deal," The man said smoothly and let go of his hand, reaching into his jacket to pull out a small shiny object. He placed the object in his hand and Lance saw that it was a silver coin. The Galran symbol was etched into the surface of the metal with a gold trim surrounding it. He turned it over in his fingers, inspecting it.

"This is how you will get in. I assume you will be able to figure out the time and address, so I won't bother telling you," Lotor explained. Lance nodded and reached into his own pocket, fishing out a fake business card that Pidge helped him design. It was completely black on both sides and had his name written in silver cursive in the middle, a simple phone number at the bottom. Lotor took it graciously and tucked it in the inside of his jacket in one swift move. 

"Pleasure doing business with you,  _Monsieur Lacroix_." He turned around on his heels and began walking out, but Lance stopped him with a hand on his wrist. Lotor froze. 

"Why do you trust me so easily?" Lance voiced the question that has been on his mind the whole time. He was genuinely curious. Lotor was known for being very careful in who he deals with, so for him to strike up a random deal with someone was surprising. Especially if that someone was practically a ghost before that day. 

Lotor seemed caught off guard by the question, but he shook it off quickly. "My intuition has never failed me," was all he said before turning around once more and leaving the room. Lance stood there by himself, alone in a club after just having made a deal with the devil himself. What has he just gotten himself into? 

Without more thought, he stepped out a minute after Lotor had and was instantly met with a familiar face again. A feeling of relief washed over him, but that was wiped away the moment the person opened their mouth. 

"Where the literal fuck have you been?" Keith practically yelled over the loud music. Inside the private room everything was much more quiet and muted, so stepping back into the sweaty common area was a different change of scene to say the least.

"Where the fuck have  _you_ been?" Lance hissed, pulling him to the side in case someone was reading their lips. There was no way anyone could hear over this.

"Uh, doing my job?" 

"Well, so have I!" Lance threw his arms up in the air.

Keith rolled his eyes and crossed his arms over his chest, "Flirting with people isn't a job."

"Okay, first of all, yes it is! It's called being a call girl." 

"Jesus, just say 'hooker'."

"Don't disrespect call girls like that!"

Keith sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose, "Why am I here?" 

" _Uh, to do your job?_ _"_ Lance mocked Keith's arrogant voice, which he did not appreciate. 

"Shut up, fine, what have you got?" Keith gave in and asked. Lance smiled in victory and brought out the coin that he received from Lotor. That seemed to get Keith's attention, because he raised his eyebrows.

"What am I looking at?" he asked. Now it was Lance's turn to roll his eyes.

"It's our ticket into Lotor's douchey gala!" he said excitedly with a mocking tone. Keith nodded in approval, not acting surprised that Lance had actually done something productive.

"I got something interesting," Keith said lowly and discreetly pulled a small vial out of his pocket. The thing wasn't even the size of his finger and contained a mysterious golden liquid inside that shone a bit in the dark of the corner they were in.

"A mini glow stick?" 

"No, you idiot." Keith quickly shoved it back into his front pants pocket. "It's quintessence."

"The fuck is that?" Lance blinked, almost positive that Keith just made that word up.

He groaned, "It's a hallucinogen that was recently developed by the Galra. This stuff is super strong and has been circulating the country rapidly. It's like if LSD was on LSD."

"A drug? Matt's intel was serious about that?" Lance asked in shock and Keith nodded grimly. They both knew what this meant. For their mission and for the good of the people.

 

"The Galra just turned itself from the most wanted terrorist group in America to the largest drug cartel in Japan."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is literally such a mess, it almost turned into a fucking lancelot fic lmao. sorry I haven't been consistently updating chapters, this little thing called CRIPPLING DEPRESSION has really been taking a toll on me. I am going to a week long camp next week so don't expect anything to be uploaded. but who knows, maybe I'll surprise myself.
> 
> also that last little banter with klance is loosely based off of every single interaction between lana and archer from the show archer.
> 
> follow me on [tumblr](http://arisushanti.tumblr.com/) and [instagram](https://www.instagram.com/arisushxnti/) !
> 
> i made an inspo playlist based off this fic, you can listen to it on spotify [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/omgitsreynaa/playlist/4VUPrPU9xlMItnQUQCNF0F?si=qyDRQd9jTXOY-WpPiZBAhQ)


	9. Party 'til We're Dead

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> troublemakers attract trouble wherever they go

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> gonna try to change the Japanese to the romanized version and put the translations in the end notes.

"God damn it," Lance seethed, running a hand through his hair. Every time they received new information about the Galra it was bad news, but this one might have to take the cake. 

"I know." Keith pursed his lips together in a grimace. "Let's talk somewhere else."

Lance spared a quick glance at the private room he was just in and considered it for a second, only to shake his head. It probably had a secret camera that Lance didn't notice or the room had been bugged. He knew the Galra left nothing to chance, so neither would they. He looked around the room a bit to see if there was any place they could go, then his eyes landed on the bathroom sign just behind them. 

"Follow me," Lance said and nodded his head towards the men's room.

"I am not going with you to the washroom, you can go yourself," Keith said bluntly, remaining unmoved. Lance stared at him with dead eyes. 

"No, you idiot, just come on." He grabbed the reluctant Keith by his arm and dragged him into the washroom. Not to Lance's surprise, the place was pristine and incredibly clean. Keith yanked his arm out of Lance's grip and glared.

"Don't just grab me like that!" he snapped, turning his face away so Lance couldn't see his expression. He guessed it was angry. 

"Okay, I'm sorry, Jesus!" Lance held his hands up in surrender. "Look, now we have a place to discuss the issues that have come up."

Keith huffed in response and Lance took that as a sign of him giving in. He opened his mouth to start voicing his ideas on what they should do for the time being, when the door suddenly swung open. Before he even turned around, a small twinge of despair went through his body at the thought of the person who entered the room being Lotor. Thankfully, it was just some random drunk guy who stumbled into their conversation. Lance felt a wave of relief come over and was glad it was some drunk guy, until the man began to barf up the contents of his stomach onto the floor near them.

Keith's quick reflexes kicked in and he pulled Lance back, away from the blast zone. "What the fuck?"

"Let's go in here instead." Lance turned away in disgust and gently pushed Keith into one of the open stalls. He went in behind him, closing the door and locking it with a 'click'. "Okay, we should be clear of any projectile vomit."

Lance had his head turned towards the door to see if he could get a peak of anyone else coming in. He felt Keith nod and take a deep breath behind him and-wait why could he feel him breathing? Lance turned around slowly and found himself nearly chest to chest with him. Damn these stupid high-tech Japanese toilets that take up so much space in bathroom stalls! Keith looked up at him and furrowed his brows together. 

"What's wrong with your face?" he asked with genuine concern that Lance didn't even register. He was too busy taking in every single detail about Keith's face.

"Why do you keep asking me that?! There's nothing wrong with it!" Lance evaded his partner's deep stare to avoid getting even more embarrassed than he already was, but Keith kept up his persistent gaze.

"You look like you're burning up," Keith raised a hand and- _holy shit_ -pressed the back of it against his cheek. "Are you drunk?"

"I am not! Let's just focus on the big problem here!" Lance could physically  _feel_ his face heating up even more. He's never stood in such close proximity to Keith, so everything was just confusing. To be fair, things could be much worse. The blood that rushed to his cheeks could have gone to other, more awkward places. Or he could be covered in vomit or something.

"The fact that our only exit has an unconscious drunk man in the way?" Keith asked.

Lance shook his head, "Quintessence. What else did you learn about it?" 

"Oh right. First off, it causes major health issues, obviously. Short term memory, memory loss, increased suicidal tendencies, hallucinations even when you're not high, delusions of grandeur. Those are only some of the effects," Keith explained. 

"So, we're dealing with some pretty bad shit then," Lance summarized. 

"Yes, we are."

"Where did they get a chemist?"

Keith shrugged, "That's what I'd like to know too."

"Shit," Lance hissed. "On top of knowing absolutely nothing, we know absolutely nothing."

Keith gave him and offended look. "Well, what did you find out about then? Other than a coin that I probably could have forged myself."

Did this guy always have to take everything like it's an insult? "That's now what I meant."

"Whatever, let's just get out of here and send the samples to Pidge back at the hotel." Keith shifted and leaned forward even closer to Lance, his warm breath hitting Lance's neck. 

Alarms blared inside his head. What was he doing? No, don't get closer, stay back! He moved in so close that their chests were barely a centimeter apart, his arm maneuvering around Lance's back. With a click, the stall door unlocked behind him and Keith pushed it open. When he looked back up at Lance, their faces were no more than a breath away.

"Are you just gonna stay standing there?" Keith asked. Lance shook his head and turned on his heel quickly, stepping out of the stall and making sure to stay as far away from the puddle of vomit as possible. 

 Lance scrunched his face up in disgust when the smell hit his nose. God, he hated nightclubs. For safe measures, he decided to wash his hands. He knew that his hands were (relatively) clean, but looking at the gross mess made him think twice. Keith seemed to have the same train of thought as he joined him at the sinks. 

"Let's get out of this place now," Keith said and wiped his hands on his pants like the absolute heathen that he was. He went to open the door and as soon as it swung open, a large man stepped in, nearly knocking Keith over. 

 _"Namen ja ne, konoyaro!"_ The man spat at Keith, pushing him aside into the wall. Keith's back hit the bricks with a thump and the man shoved his way past Lance as well. 

Keith pursed his lips together in anger, his eyebrows furrowing tightly. Lance could tell that he was biting his tongue to make sure he wouldn't curse the guy out for body checking him into a wall. A part of him was afraid that he'd actually punch him. 

A second later, another man that was just as tall as the first walked in as well. This time he didn't body check anyone, but he wore a pair of dark Men In Black type sunglasses. What kind of asshole wore sunglasses inside a club at night? The man glanced at Lance and he averted his gaze. Something told him that he wouldn't want to engage with these guys. 

 _"Allons-y,"_ Lance mumbled and grabbed his seething partner by the arm. With just their luck, one last man walked into the washroom and slammed into their retreating bodies. Lance stumbled back and stared in disbelief at the unfortunate string of scary men in suits. He did have to comment that this guy standing in front of him was pretty short though. 

"Watch it," he hissed and stared down at Keith. "Wait, hang on..."

Keith's eyes flashed through confusion at first, then settled on shock and fear. "We should go, Christian." He attempted to make his way through the blocked doorway. 

"Hold on!" The third man pushed him back with a hand. "I know you."

_Oh fuck. That can't be good._

The first man who walked in looked up from the sink where he was washing his hands and took a good look at Keith. His eyes narrowed, then widened in recognition. 

"You!" he spoke in English this time and pointed a finger at Keith, moving towards him. Lance shot his arm out and protectively put it around Keith's shoulder 

"I don't know what you are thinking,  _connard_ , but we caused no harm." He switched into his French accent with ease. Keith seemed to have no debates with the physical contact, so he tightened his grip. 

"You are part of Altea!" The short man pulled out a knife from inside his suit jacket and held it up threateningly. "I remember you from the raid!"

To Lance's knowledge, there were no Galra survivors from that mission. Everyone on site had been killed, to add to that Zarkon had been gravely injured as well. The fact that there were loose ends walking around was bad. Super bad. This was not going to end without a fight.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Keith said raising his hands up into the air in surrender. Why was he giving up? Keith never backed out of a fight. The three men now moved around to stand in front of them, and Keith lifted his arms high into the air. His jacket lifted up slightly with the movements, and Lance looked down at his back. Tucked in the hem of his pants was a familiar looking handle peaking out. Lance understood what he needed to do, and slowly moved his arm from around Keith's shoulder to his hips.

"You may have been wearing a bandanna, but I would recognize those cold eyes anywhere!" Lance heard one of them yell and he looked up again. All of them were livid and had some sort of blade in their hands, each of them holding them expertly and with confidence. Okay, so these guys definitely wanted a fight.

"I don't know what-," Keith started, but the one who yelled cut him off. 

"You shot my brother in the stomach! He pleaded with you to show mercy, but you left him to die a slow and painful death! Where is your honour?" He roared his words and took a step toward Keith. The two took a step back automatically.

"Let's calm down, I think you have the wrong person," Lance reasoned. The man quickly turned towards him with a bit of a stumble, and Lance took in that his left leg was lame, presumably from an injury. His face tightened into a wince, but he kept moving towards them. 

"I know I have the right man! I stared him dead in the eyes when he took one look at me trying to save my brother, then shot me in the leg!" His knife was now pointed directly at Keith's face. He had to make a move now, or else Keith might end up being the one to bleed out on the floor. Lance slowly began to raise the arm that wasn't around Keith into the air, showing his surrender.

"Even if he did kill him, you do not want a fight right now" he said lowly, looking at the faces of the other two men behind him. The short one didn't seem to be as interested in who Keith was, but was just looking for a fight and the one in sunglasses had a completely blank expression. Both held knives in their hand and Lance could see that the short one also had a gun in a holster that was attached to his belt. He knew exactly what he had to do. 

"No! I'm taking him down, along with you, pretty boy!" The man made a big windup and jabbed his knife towards Keith, and that was when the whole room erupted. 

In the instant that the big man made an advance on Keith, he was able to duck out of its way and Lance was able to grab the gun tucked in his pants, just as he moved out of reach. The short man's eyes widened when he saw the gun in Lance's hand, his own moving towards his firearm on his belt, but he was too late. Lance fired and the shot went to his forehead in an explosion of red. He was only able to get a short glance at Keith, watching as he slid his hidden knife from out of his sleeve and stabbed upwards at the man that loomed over him.

That was all he was able to see because suddenly, a blade came into view. Lance made an astounding observation that the knife was about to stab him directly in the neck. His free hand shot up and he grabbed the attacker's wrist, bringing his gun up to shoot him in the face. Unfortunately, he was too slow and the sunglasses guy kicked his hand, causing Lance to drop his gun.

With no weapon, he let go of his hand and backed up, bringing his hands up in a defensive fighting position and planting his right foot firmly behind him. His opponent finally dropped his emotionless facade and cracked a wicked smile, jabbing the knife forward. Lance pushed his wrist away and deflected it before it could make contact. He stabbed again, and Lance blocked it again. 

The man continued to advance on him with every jab he took, and every step back that Lance had to take to avoid the attacks put him at a disadvantage. Soon, Lance found his back hitting the wall behind him and he made the mistake of hesitating. The sunglasses guy took advantage of the moment and shoved the knife towards his face. Lance was barely able to dodge it and the blade nicked the side of his cheek, drawing a thin red line of blood. The man stopped to smile at him again and Lance frowned, instantly kicking down on the man's knee, popping it out. 

 _"Kuso!"_ he cried out, and stumbled backwards only to fall on the floor, still clutching the knife tightly in his hand. Lance dusted himself off and picked up his gun that had fallen to the ground, pointing it at the man's head. 

"No, please!" he pleaded, and Lance rolled his eyes. His finger moved to the trigger and was about to shoot, when suddenly a beefy man was tackling him to the ground. 

"Oof!" Lance hit the ground hard, the back of his head smacking against the tiles. Before he even got a chance to breathe again, the breath was knocked out of him again when a large foot pressed down on his chest. 

The large man snarled down at him, his face was bloody and bruises were already forming on his cheeks. " _Shine!"_

Lance's hand moved towards the ring he had on his left hand and squeezed the sides of it, the emblem on it began to glow blue. With as much force as possible, he slammed his fist into the man's leg. 

The ring made a loud buzzing noise and lit up a bright blue, sending a large shock through the man’s body. He seized up and his body shook for a couple of seconds, then he fell to the floor beside Lance in an unconscious heap

He was so glad Pidge invented the shock ring, and that he had bothered to bring it.

Lance quickly got up to his feet, just in time to see Keith emerge from one of the stalls, pushing the sunglasses man out into the open with him from when they traded dance partners. The man stumbled backwards and hit the sinks, clutching them to keep balance, but it was a useless attempt. He fell to the ground and clutched the knee that Lance had popped out. 

“Don’t kill me! Please!” he cried out, his hands grasped together like he was praying. 

Keith threw his knife up into the air and caught it, never breaking eye contact with him. “Why should I? You know who we are, you’ll go tell your boss.” 

“I have information-” 

“So do we.” Keith responded, kneeling in front of him, knife pointed at his neck.

“-About quintessence!” he cried. Keith stopped, then turned towards Lance, almost as if asking for his input.

Lance shrugged. “Tell us.” 

“The Witch! She’s this lady who is bat shit crazy and has some deep connection with Zarkon! She’s the one who made the drug,” the man explained. 

“Anything else?” Keith asked. The man stuttered and struggled to think of something. 

Lance picked his gun off the floor and twirled it around his finger, moving to stand beside Keith’s crouched form. The move made the man even more anxious.

”Weapons! The Dragons are making weapons for the Galra," he said in a rush, grasping at straws. "I know where they are!" 

"Where?" Lance asked immediately. 

"The locations that I know are on my phone, it's in my jacket pocket." He gestured towards his right side. Keith eyed him carefully and bent down to grab it, all the while Lance held the man in his steady sights. He got it with no fight whatsoever and unlocked the phone, it had no password for some stupid reason.

"It's in the notes," the man said. Keith went to the notes app and just as he had said, there they were. A list of three locations, each in completely different parts of the country. Keith closed the phone and put it in his jacket pocket carefully. 

"Thank you for that," he said, turning back towards the man who still clutched his knee on the floor. The sunglasses guy looked up at him hopefully. 

"Does that mean you'll let me go?" he asked, looking back and forth between the two. 

"Lance?" Keith turned to him, and used his knife to gesture at the man. Lance looked over at him and analyzed his expression. His whole face looked convincingly terrified and optimistic, but his eyes were almost completely emotionless. There was just the remnants of a dark glint in them. Lance sighed, and nodded.

The man seemed to take that as a sign that they were sparing him and he began to ramble his gratitude, "Thank you, thank you! I promise I won't tell a soul-."

The gunshot echoed in the empty bathroom. The man's face froze, his mouth still open from his unfinished sentence and he slowly fell to the ground, motionless. Lance lowered the his pistol and looked at Keith. 

"That was fun," he said, dusting off the nonexistent dust on his shoulder. 

"Don't forget about the one that you knocked out with your ring," Keith pointed at said man who had passed out on the floor. Lance frowned, crossing his arms across his chest. 

"I'm not going to kill an unconscious man."

"Why not?"

"It goes against my morals."

"I can wake him up if you want."

Lance groaned and shook his head. "You do it." He handed Keith's gun back to him and he took it, shrugging. Without a moment of hesitation, he shot the giant man in the head and tucked his gun back into the hem of his pants. God, how ruthless.

"Let's hurry up and leave before an unsuspecting janitor walks in to clean up the mess and catches us," Lance said, but then realized something and stopped. He turned towards the corner of the room, and the drunk man who had passed out earlier was still lying there. Asleep. 

Keith let out a little laugh, "No fucking way." 

"Impressive," Lance commented. He looked around the room and took in the spare gun that was dropped on the floor from one of the attackers, then to the man who seemed to be enjoying his peaceful ethylic coma. An idea came into his head, and as sick as it was, he was going to do it. He went over to the body of the short man, plucked the gun from his hand, and placed it in the hand of the passed out guy on the floor. Lance looked over at Keith for approval. 

"Sure, that works." He said with a shrug. It wasn't like the Galra would be so thorough as to question if the scene was framed or not. They would probably just see it as some angry drunk guy who went crazy. Lance tried not to think of what would happen to the innocent man afterwards, but sometimes you had to do what you had to do. 

" _Now_ let's go, I just want to go to bed," Lance complained, shoving the door open. Keith came out behind him and placed a sign on the door, walking away. It was an 'Out of Order' sign. 

"Where did you get that from?" Lance asked him when Keith caught up. He shrugged off the question, which led Lance to think that he secretly kept signs hidden up his ass. 

"Let's just go," Keith said, and disappeared into the crowded dance floor to get to the exit. Lance shrugged and followed him into the abyss. 

* * *

 

By the time they got back to their room in Kobe, it was already past four in the morning and Lance was just about ready to pass out. He stumbled through the doorway and kicked off his shoes wildly. Keith, who had followed in behind him, was hit directly in the knee by the flying footwear. 

"Can you watch it?" he said with a yawn, kicking off his shoes in a similar manner. They were both dead tired.

"Shut up, Keith," Lance mumbled under his breath and shuffled through the dark blindly, not bothering to turn on the lights. He hit multiple pieces of furniture on the way to the bedroom, and with each bump he let out a little groan. He heard Keith sigh behind him and there was a small 'click', then Lance's eyes were bombarded with white. 

"Just turn on the lights, idiot," Keith sneered and walked past him into their shared bedroom. Lance shielded his now blind eyes, and made dramatic hissing sounds. 

"Warning next time!" he protested, turning it off again while Keith just scoffed. Lance made his way to the room, threw open the doors, and fell face first onto the giant king sized bed. Keith stood to the side with his shirt halfway unbuttoned and stared at him. 

"Get off, you're getting blood on the sheets," he said. Lance raised his hand from the bed, not looking up once, and flipped him off. 

"At least change out of your clothes, you look disgusting," he said, and Lance could  _hear_ him rolling his eyes. To be fair, he did have blood on him and he did feel pretty gross. God only knows how they were able to commute all the way back to Kobe without getting stopped for suspected murder. His perfectly white shirt had been stained with countless blood spatters from all the shooting. 

Lance groaned for the umpteenth time that day and got up. With his back facing Keith, he stripped all the way down so he was only in his boxers, and flopped down on the bed again. He couldn't care less honestly, he just wanted to sleep. Apparently, Keith still wasn't satisfied. 

"Can you put on some clothes? Also, why are you the one getting the bed?" he protested, moving to stand next to the side of the bed Lance was currently occupying. 

"My body count for today is higher than yours." Lance's words were muffled by the sheets. He really wished that Keith would just leave him alone. 

"That's a fucked up way of deciding who gets the bed." 

"God, just shut up, please," Lance sat up and glared at him. "Plus, you're the one who killed a defenseless man who was unconscious."

"You're the one who framed a defenseless man who was unconscious," Keith shot back and met his glare with one of his own. They stayed in that position for what felt like forever, staring each other down and waiting for the other to back off. Fine, maybe they both were fucked up people. If he didn't do it then the Galra would get suspicious, and might catch on to their real identities. But that was probably what Keith was saying to himself as well. 

Lance gave in and looked away, "Fine, whatever, you win. You deserve it, since you apparently did so much more than me today." He stood up and walked out of the room, bumping Keith's shoulder on the way out. Keith stood there and watched him go, frowning. 

"Lance, wait!" he called out and Lance turned around in the door frame, an expectant look on his face. 

Keith opened his mouth to say something, hesitated, then closed it again, deciding against it. "Nevermind, goodnight."

Lance shrugged and grudgingly walked out of the room. He probably could have shared the bed with him, but he just wasn't comfortable with it at that point in time. He doubted he was even comfortable  _talking_ about it. So, since he chose the path of sleeping alone tonight, Lance went for the couch. 

He grabbed a blanket that rested on one of the arms of the couch and spread it over himself. Slowly, he settled down and dropped his head onto the pillow. A sigh left his lips as he was finally able to relax after a long day. This had to be the most eventful day he's ever had in his entire life. Two plane hijackers killed, car chase with a shootout, faked death, went to a nightclub and made a deal with the head of a terrorist group, another fight with three dudes killed. 

Lance should not be alive right now, but he was. He lived this long through all the dangers, he could live a lot longer. Plus, this is what he signed up for. The shooting, the killing, the explosions. Sure he could die any day, but it was for the greater good. It didn't matter if it was dangerous as hell...

Because god damn, he loved this job.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRANSLATIONS (may not be accurate, but this is what i was trying to convey)  
> "Sumimasen" - Excuse me  
> "Namen ja ne, konoyaro!" - Watch it, you prick!  
> "Allons-y" - Let's go  
> "Connard" - Asshole  
> "Shine!" - Die!
> 
> \----  
> i know what you're thinking: holy shit, wait, this was all in the span of one day (kinda, if you don't count the time difference from the plane ride) how the fuck are they still awake. well, two words, my friends. fucking naps. also someone give me credit for not making that last scene super cringey by shoving uncomfortable sexual tension between the two of them. and some of you have been asking if there will be a chapter that is in keith's pov, and there will be eventually, so don't worry. anyone catch the six of crows reference?
> 
> side note: wow s6 fucked me up, like jesus christ, finally some delicious fucking food. i genuinely liked lotor tho and was disappointed but not surprised.
> 
>  
> 
> thanks for 3k hits and 200+ kudos y'all, i appreciate it so much! if you like this fic, share it with your post s6 klance loving friends!
> 
> follow me on [tumblr](http://arisushanti.tumblr.com/) and [instagram](https://www.instagram.com/arisushxnti/) !
> 
> i made an inspo playlist based off this fic, you can listen to it on spotify [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/omgitsreynaa/playlist/4VUPrPU9xlMItnQUQCNF0F?si=qyDRQd9jTXOY-WpPiZBAhQ)


	10. Allez-vous, Mon Cheri

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> keith and lance see who can be the sassiest/most angsty (hint: it's a tie)

You would think that after everything that he had been through, Lance would be able to get the chance to sleep in for once. Boy, was he wrong about that. 

"Get up," A low, rough voice broke his peaceful and serene sleep. The curtains to the balcony were ripped open and light poured into the room.

 _"Cinco minutos más,"_ Lance groaned, pulling the covers over his head in an attempt to block the sunlight from getting in his face. Give it to Keith to always have a stick up his ass, even after the night they had just been through. He heard a sigh from above him, and then there was the cold rush of ice water being poured over him. 

"What the fuck!" Lance jumped up, his blankets slipping off his body, completely soaked. "What was that for?!"

"Come on, the agency is about to call in, get dressed." Keith stood over him, an empty glass in his hand that he set down on the coffee table in front of him. Lance glared up at him. 

"Couldn't you have woken me up a normal way? Like nudge me, or play some music?" he grumbled, wrapping the blanket around his waist because he just realized that he had no pants on. And he was now dripping wet and super cold. 

"I'm not going to sing you a song, McClain. And you would have complained either way, water or not. So, I decided I would enjoy myself," Keith said with a little smirk and turned around to go into the kitchen. Lance glared at his back, silently cursing him and he reluctantly stood up, dragging the blankets with him. Stupid Keith with his stupid smug looks.

He lumbered towards the bedroom and went over to get a change of clothes, but the bathroom caught his eye. He really was in desperate need of a shower, considering he still hadn't washed off all the blood and sweat yet. A quick rinse wouldn't hurt, he thought with a shrug. 

Lance went into the connecting bathroom that was there and stripped off what little clothing he had on, stepping into the shower. He closed the glass door behind him and turned on the water. The cold spray hit him first and Lance yelped, but then it slowly turned nice and hot to his delight. He let out a sigh and let the water run over him for a bit. It felt good. 

Quickly, he finished washing up and stepped out of the shower, grabbing a towel and wrapping it around his waist. Lance moved towards the sink to inspect himself in the mirror. He had bags under his eyes and he could tell that the cut on his cheek that he got last night would form into a scar. He frowned, grabbed another towel to dry his hair, and stepped out into the living room. 

"-Pidge will run a scan on it later, meanwhile what else happened?" Lance instantly recognized the voice immediately as Allura's coming from Keith's laptop. He made his way over to where Keith was on the couch that he slept earlier, his computer open on the coffee table.

"Perfect timing, Lance, we need you to update Allura on- why are you still naked?" Keith looked up from the screen and when he took in Lance's attire, his face fell into a frown. Lance rolled his eyes and forced him to scoot over on the couch with an annoyed wave of his hand. 

"Leave me alone. Hi, Allura," Lance greeted her with a smile, nodding towards the webcam. Finally, someone who wouldn't be as nagging and controlling as Keith. 

"Lance, put on a shirt." The image of Allura shook her head at him with a chuckle. "Now, what else did you two uncover?" 

"I got a direct ticket into Lotor's fun little prick party, Keith found some drugs, three Galra men who remembered Keith from the night of the raid attacked us and we killed them, obtaining one of their phones that has the supposed locations of where the weapons are being manufactured," Lance summarized quickly. Keith looked at him, blinking, then turned back to Allura on screen. 

"That covered about everything." Keith shrugged. Allura hummed. 

"I see. You said they remembered Keith from the infiltration mission Voltron did a couple of months ago?" Allura asked. The two nodded in unison. "That's not good, we had a team come in and make sure everyone was dead. It was led by Captain Shirogane himself."

"We might have a mole on our hands. Or maybe the man managed to escape before the team came in shortly after," Keith suggested. Allura just pursed her lips together in thought. 

"Let's just hope it was the latter and that he was the only one. I will look into it later though," she said. "We also looked at the addresses that you gave us Keith, and cross referenced them with our data. One of the three lines up with what we know, so you two should check that one out first."

"Yes, ma'am." Lance gave her a small salute and she rolled her eyes. 

"If that is all you have, then I should get going. Goodbye." Allura waved and was about to end the call, but Lance stopped her. 

"Wait! I have a question." He held a hand up for her stop. She looked at him curiously, then nodded for him to continue. "Why didn't you tell us about the secret marriage play?"

"What? What are you talking about?" she asked him, tilting her head to the side. That just made him more confused, and he turned to Keith for help. 

"Our room. It's the honeymoon suite." Keith explained, gesturing around as if it would help explain his point

"And if that doesn't scream 'hey, we're gay and married!' then I don't know what does!" Lance added with a frown. Allura squinted in thought, still clearly confused as to what they were talking about, then her eyes widened in realization. 

"Pidge!" she yelled behind her, and the short girl came running in, clutching her laptop in her arms.

"What is it? I'm in the middle of running scans on that 'quintessence' stuff you sent in," she frowned, but when she looked at the screen her eyes lit up the tiniest bit. "Hey Lance! Keith."

"Hey!" Lance said, waving. 

"Hi," Keith nodded at her. 

"Pidge, you were the one I told to book Lance and Keith's room. Why is it the honeymoon one?" she asked sternly, crossing her arms over her chest. Pidge shrugged. 

"I don't know. You told me to, and I quote, _'book the biggest room they have, I don't care what it is, just do it.'"_ She made air quotes with her fingers. Allura groaned and facepalmed. 

"I should have known you would have taken my words literally. You can go now and continue what you were doing." She waved her off, and Pidge shrugged, walking away. 

"I am so sorry boys, that was completely my fault. I should have double checked with you and Pidge about accommodations." Allura shook her head.  

"It's okay, I'm pretty sure that's the first mistake you've ever made in your entire life, so it isn't that bad." Lance waved it off with a smile. That seemed to get her feeling better and she laughed a bit.

Pidge’s head popped into frame again behind Allura and she asked, “Who’s idea was it to be married?” 

“Lance’s," Keith said bluntly, pointing at him and Lance flushed red. 

"What no!" he argued, throwing his arms up in the air, poking his finger at the camera towards Pidge. "It is not like that!"

"So, it was  _Lance's idea, huh?"_ she smirked, wiggling her eyebrows at him. Lance groaned, and hid his face in his hands. He knew this was going to come eventually.

"I don't understand what's happening right now," Keith blinked at Allura on screen for help, and she just shrugged. 

"I'm in the same boat as you, unfortunately." 

" _Anyways!_ Keith and I need to go-" Lance started, but was cut off by Pidge snickering.

"Do what, Lance?" 

"Shut up- we're going to go check out that address that lines up with our intel," Lance continued. Pidge waved her goodbye's and walked out of frame, her laughter carrying out throughout the whole room. She totally did all of this on purpose just to piss him off for that one time he messed with her. Sure, he made her lose when she was about to get first place on some stupid game, but it wasn't that big of a deal. Well, now she was always on his ass every second of every day, so maybe it was a big deal.

"Okay, call in tonight. Goodbye, Lance and Keith." Allura nodded her head with a smile, and the call ended with a 'beep'. Keith closed the lid of the laptop and turned to Lance. He already knew what he was about to say. 

"What was that about?" he asked. There it was. "No, better question, what did you do?"

Lance sighed, "She was about to get her first win in some battle royale game and I pulled the plug on her computer as a prank."

"That was stupid of you." 

"Yeah, I know."

"Okay, now put on some pants please.."

"I will wear-or not wear- whatever I choose, Keith," he stuck his tongue out and got up to go get changed, despite his words. Keith just groaned and shook his head, watching Lance's retreating form.

* * *

 

"Can you hurry up?" Keith's annoyed voice came from outside the bedroom door, his fist banging against the wood. Lance glared at the reflection of the door in the mirror and sighed. Never any peace and quiet.

"Things like this take time and effort! Do you think I just wake up looking absolutely stunning?" Lance yelled back through the door, carefully dabbing some concealer under his eyes to cover up the dark circles that were there. Okay, so he wore a little bit of makeup everyday, sue him. Most of the time it was to cover up blemishes or his atrociously noticeable bags that he would get under his eyes. It was totally socially acceptable for men to use concealer, and if anyone said it wasn't then they are wrong. 

"Don't care, hurry up." Lance could  _hear_ him rolling his eyes from beyond the door and he groaned. With a huff, he checked himself in the mirror one last time. Since they were going out into town, he decided to go for casual wear this time, making sure that he looked as normal and tourist-y as possible. Just some simple jeans and a random sweatshirt that he pulled on that reminded him of his highschool days would suffice. 

He dubbed himself ready, and walked towards the door, swinging it open. Keith's hand was already raised in a fist to knock on it and when he realized the door had opened, he slowly lowered it. "Great, let's go," he said while clearing his throat.

"What are we bringing today? We're just doing recon, right?" Lance asked, walking past him to the closet near the front door.

He unlocked the doors and opened them up, revealing the treasures inside. Weapons. A shit load of weapons. Rifles were hung by the strap where you would normally put coats, and on top of the shelves were lined with different sized knives, ranging from shank to shiv. Inside the shelves were different sized clips, magazines and ammunition. They could take out an army with all of these.

Keith hummed and took a long look at their arsenal, "Nothing big. I was thinking we can just bug the place and set up hidden cameras around." 

"Sure, got it." Lance reached in and grabbed his trusty dusty 4th generation Glock 17. He turned it over in his hand a bit, then checked to see if it was loaded. He counted exactly seventeen rounds in the magazine and nodded, pushing it back into place. He shoved the gun in the hem of the back of his pants, barrel first and pulled the long sweater over to conceal it. Lance gazed at the many rounds of ammo they had and decided to take another magazine with him, but he doubted he'd need it. He could kill 20 people with half of what was in his clip right now.

Keith, who decided to wear a leather jacket, shoved as many knives as possible in as many places as possible on his person. Lance was half worried that he'd put one up his ass. 

"Why do you need so many? It's not like you need to reload them or something," Lance commented, pointing at the 5th knife that Keith was about to put in his shoe. He stopped and stood up, staring at Lance with the blade part between his fingers, and suddenly his arm was reeling back in a throwing motion and the knife was flying past his face. It stuck into the wooden door behind him with a ' _'thunk'_ and Lance turned back to him in partial horror. His hands went up immediately in surrender. 

"Okay, jeez, bring as many as you want!" Lance gave in, backing up slowly. 

"I wasn't actually going to hit you."

"I think you overestimate your aiming abilities," Lance mumbled, which earned him a hard punch to the shoulder. Yeah, he expected that. That doesn't mean it made it hurt any less. 

Lance frowned, rubbing his shoulder. "Don't hit me!"

"Don't insult me," Keith said bluntly, adjusting his jacket to make sure the knives would sit comfortable inside it. 

"It was just a little joke, calm down." 

"And it was just a little punch, calm down!" 

Lance threw his arms up in exasperation. "This whole mission is going to be such a nightmare to get through! I wouldn't be surprised if I wound up captured or dead by tomorrow." 

That seemed to get a reaction out of Keith. His head snapped up towards Lance, his eyes trained on him intensely, fists clenched until his knuckles turned white. A vein in his forehead popped out and he looked as if he was going to punch Lance in the face for what he said. Lance didn't flinch at the sudden animosity, but he did step back the tiniest bit in fear of getting socked in the face. Keith took in his movements for a moment, looking him up and down until his gaze settled on Lance's face again. He let out a breath and his shoulders relaxed a bit

"Just-," he took in a deep breath and closed his eyes, turning away. "Play your part and do your job for once."

With his head down to avoid any eye contact, Keith pushed past Lance to the door. It slammed behind him and Lance was left alone in the room to wonder what that random outburst was for. He shouldn't be that shocked though, Keith was fairly unstable most of the time, especially when it came to the success of a mission. The only annoying thing was that he had forgotten to take the rest of the equipment with him that they were supposed to pack. He sighed, grabbing a backpack that sat at the bottom of the closet and filled it with random bits of technology that they would need.

When Lance opened the front door again, he was surprised to see Keith leaning against the wall beside it. He had his eyes closed in thought and opened them when he heard Lance emerge from the room. Keith looked at him for a brief moment, then glanced downwards at the bag in his hand.

"Did you bring everything?" 

Lance stared at him. "If you helped me then you would know the answer to that." Keith ignored the statement and continued.

"Cameras?"

"Yes."

"Scanners?"

"Uh-huh."

"Sensors?

"Yep," he popped the 'p' in an exaggerated manner, a bored look on his face. He sounded like his mom checking his school bag on the first day before he went on the bus. 

"Let's go," he said with a nod and grabbed the bag out of Lance's hands, hefting it over his shoulder as he walked down the hall towards the elevators. Lance watched him walk away in confusion. For someone who was supposed to be a master at analyzing people, he was never be able to understand Keith. One second he wants to punch him, the next he was completely indifferent. Whatever.

Lance caught up to him easily, and reached over to grab the bag from him again, but Keith moved away. "I'll hold it, it's fine," he insisted.

"Whatever, then." Lance shrugged. They reached the elevator and he pressed the down button. Almost instantly, the doors opened up and the two stepped inside. 

"We should hurry, our ride is waiting." Keith pressed the button that would lead them down to the lobby and the elevator began to descend.

"Our ride?" Lance asked, looking at him. Keith nodded. 

"While you were in the shower, I called someone," he said, providing absolutely no information.

"What, like an uber?" The doors opened and they stepped out.

Keith shook his head, "Not exactly."

Lance, utterly confused, walked out to the lobby and turned the corner to go out the doors. He looked out the large glass windows just in time to see an incredibly expensive car screech to a stop at front. He walked towards the exit, reaching for the door handle, but the doorman who stood to the side opened it for him with a small bow. Almost forgot that that was a thing. 

Lance walked through the doors, gave the doorman a nod of thanks, and stood in front of the shiny black sports car that had just pulled up. Keith moved to stand beside him and the doors of the car automatically opened upwards, resembling wings. A man was sitting in the drivers seat and when the doors opened up fully, Lance instantly recognized him. 

Matt Holt stepped out of the car wearing a pair of reflective circle sunglasses, skinny jeans, and a white tank top. He lowered the glasses to the bridge of his nose and squinted at them. 

"Heard you boys needed a ride!" he called out and gestured to the open passenger seats. "Hop in!"

Something in Lance told him that this was a huge mistake, but despite his gut feeling, he got in. And of course, as soon as their asses touched the fancy leather seats of the car, Matt was stepping on the gas. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yeah, that's right, pidge was playing fortnite. i headcanon that she pretends to absolutely hate it, but secretly she's spent like over $200 on skins and the memey dance emotes. surprisingly, she's not that great with shooter games, so when lance turned off her computer when she was about to get her first solo win she was LIVID. i mean, i would be too though tbh.
> 
> this chapter was kinda like a filler/transition to another subsection of the fic that shall actually start in the next chapter! some history of special ops team voltron will be revealed next time as well, stay tuned ;)
> 
> edit: thank you for 100+ subs on this fic! never thought that i'd live to see the motherfucking day!
> 
> follow me on [tumblr](http://arisushanti.tumblr.com/) and [instagram](https://www.instagram.com/arisushxnti/) ! (mostly active on tumblr so you can send me an anonymous ask saying how bad and messy this is)
> 
> i made a fic playlist for ytfm, so you can listen to it on spotify [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/omgitsreynaa/playlist/4VUPrPU9xlMItnQUQCNF0F?si=qyDRQd9jTXOY-WpPiZBAhQ)


	11. The Past Will Come Back

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> batt bolt is back, baby (pretend those B's are the block B emoji on iphone, thanks)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i don't know what i'm doing but all your comments are absolutely amazing and fill me with so much love! you give me more love and I give you faster updates, a fairly simple exchange. it's only fair. (also tbh i have no idea what to name these chapters at this point, please send help)

Lance was never one to get nauseous during car rides, but there seemed to be a trend that whenever Matt Holt was at the wheel, he was sick to his stomach. 

Matt stepped on the gas pedal with a wicked grin and the car shot out of the waiting zone and onto the streets. Lance and Keith had barely sat down in their seats before they were instantly thrown into the backs of the ones in front of them. Thankfully, Lance had put his hands up just in time to prevent his face from smushing into the hard leather. Keith who had done the same beside him pushed himself back into a proper sitting position, his frown directed at Matt in the driver seat. 

"Why do you always do that?" he demanded, quickly rushing to put on his seat belt. Lance followed and reached over his shoulder, locking the strap into place with a 'click'. 

Matt smiled at him through the rear-view mirror. "Do what?" he asked innocently, but his knowing smile gave his intentions away. Now he knew where Pidge got it from.

"Nevermind, did you get the location I sent you?" Keith asked, shaking his head.

"Yeah, it'll take about half an hour to get there," he responded. His eyes went back to the road in front of him and he made a sharp turn, bringing them on the highway. The two swayed a bit in the back, and Lance furrowed his eyebrows in confusion. He looked at the location beforehand and it was pretty far. 

"Half an hour? I looked at where it was, that trip should take us 50 minutes at least," Lance explained. Matt processed his words for a second and chuckled. 

"For me? 30." There was something about that response that had Lance worried. "Anything new with you two?"

Keith shrugged, looking out the window. "Still have no idea what is going on with that quintessence business."

Matt clicked his tongue. "I don't know much about it either, honestly."

"That man we interrogated the other night mentioned something about a witch?" Lance said, trying to recall what happened. The previous night was such a blur, it went by so fast. 

 _"The Witch,_  you mean?"Matt said her codename carefully, like he was afraid that saying her name would summon her. "Not much on her, just found this out an hour ago, actually. She is supposedly this genius chemist that got hooked on cocaine and came into contact with the wrong people. They say she joined the Galra to stay safe from the debt that she collected from different gangs. Others have different theories..."

Now Lance was interested. "What other theories?" he asked. Even Keith seemed to perk up, leaning in towards Matt. 

"That she was in love with Zarkon and married him. Some even go as far as to say that they had a kid."

Lance grimaced. "Gross, isn't he like, 70?" He shivered a bit at the thought of someone actually being into that terrible old man.

"I'd guess around 65," Keith said casually. He absentmindedly slipped one of his knives from up his sleeve into his hand. He twirled the sharp blade in his hand, one finger pressed against the tip, the other hand spun the knife around on his finger. 

"I don't believe it," Lance scoffed. "Seriously? Zarkon having a wife?"

"It would explain Lotor's existence though," Keith remarked, eyes trained on the emblem that was carved into the hilt of his knife. 

"Still don't believe it. Plus, Lotor was probably fucking adopted or something." Lance laughed. He noticed out of the corner of his eye that Keith's movements halted for a single moment, then picked back up again as if nothing happened. Interesting.

"I heard you guys went to the Ivory Club last night," Matt stated, amusement laced in his voice. "You both got pretty busy, huh?"

"Well, I was just making important connections with the enemy, no big deal." Lance brushed invisible dust off his shoulder with a smirk and Keith rolled his eyes at him. Lance jabbed a finger in Keith's direction. "This guy just found a bag of fancy meth."

 _"Found_ , huh? That's not what I heard," Matt tried to stifle a chuckle and gave Keith a wink through the mirror. The other pretended not to notice and turned away to look out the window, avoiding the curious glance he got from his partner beside him. Lance tilted his head to the side. 

"What do you mean? Actually now that you mention it- Keith, how did you get that stuff anyway?" Lance asked. He figured that since quintessence was so 'good', it would be pretty expensive. It wasn't like Keith had any money on him, so Lance was interested in his methods of obtaining it.

"It's irrelevant, all that matters is that we have good samples now." Keith brought his hand up to his mouth and coughed awkwardly, trying to get the subject to change. Oh, he was not letting him go that easily, he was definitely hiding something. 

"I think it's pretty important." Lance moved closer to him, narrowing his eyes, grin widening. "If it's not a big deal then why don't you tell us?"

Keith shifted uncomfortably and sighed, looking away from the window and at the floor instead. "I just- convinced someone to give it to me," he said, incredibly unconvincingly. Lance's eyebrow cocked up and Matt let out a huffed laugh, turning into another lane quite roughly. 

"That's one way to put it."

Lance finally put all the pieces together and when he arrived at his conclusion, he gasped. "Oh my god, did you seduce someone?"

Keith slid the knife back up his sleeve and turned towards him with a deep frown. "So what if I did? It's not a big deal! I took the same class as you, McClain, we both know the same techniques," he huffed out and crossed his arms over his chest defensively. 

Oh yeah, that was true. He was honestly quite surprised to see the stone faced Keith in his persuasion workshop those couple of years ago. "I'm still better than you though," he added playfully, and sticking his tongue out at him to prove his point even further. 

"Congratulations," Keith said sarcastically. He went back to his original position of looking out the window with an angsty expression on his face.

"One question, first." Lance held up his finger and Keith turned towards him again, visibly annoyed. Lance smirked. "Was she hot?"

Keith groaned and rolled his eyes in exasperation, ignoring his question and turning back to the window again. Lance decided to tease him some more, poking his side. "No, seriously, you can tell me. No need to be shy, Red," he said his codename with a wink. 

 _"Baka,"_ Keith muttered under his breath. He may not have been fluent in Japanese, but he has seen enough Naruto to know what that meant. Matt chuckled in the front.

"By the way Keith, I found the date and location of Lotor's party that you asked me about last night," Matt said and opened up the middle CD compartment, pulling out a brown slip. He reached behind him to hand it to Keith. The other took it out of his hand and read over it a bit, Lance peering over to see as well. Scrawled in blue pen was an address with a date and time. All Lance could read was that it was somewhere in Kyoto and it was three weeks from now. 

Keith nodded then turned it over to look at the back. When he saw what was on it he frowned and looked up at Matt with a questioning look. "Did you write this on the back of a McDonald's napkin?" Keith asked, holding it up to show the signature 'M' logo in the bottom corner. 

Lance took a good look at the napkin and noticed there was a bit of ketchup on it as well. Matt's face flushed red and he stuttered out, "It was the only thing I had on me!"

"Nice, man." Lance snickered. The Holts were definitely an interesting bunch. One of them was evil in its purest form, the other used fast food restaurant napkins to write down top secret intel. He expected nothing less. 

"Nevermind that. Anything else that has happened?" Matt asked, waving his hand in the air. 

"Why are you asking? You obviously know, connections are everywhere," Keith said. 

Matt chuckled, "I want to hear how you guys explain it." 

Lance shrugged, crossing his legs. "Your sister fucked us over." 

"Oh, yes, she told me about that!" He clapped his hands together. "That's pretty funny actually."

"It really isn't," Keith muttered, shooting Lance a side glance out of the corner of his eye. "There is only one bed."

"I don't see an issue there. Surely you two adults can share a king sized bed without making it weird," Matt laughed and when he saw the expressions on Keith and Lance's face turn sour, he began to laugh more. 

"No way in hell-"

"You don't get it-," The two spoke simultaneously. They turned to each other, eyes narrowed down into a glare. It was supposed to be Lance's job to complain about things! Not Keith's. Well, that wasn't the actual reason why he was currently glaring at his partner. There was just a small part of him that hoped that Keith secretly didn't mind being close to him. Apparently not.

"Whatever." Lance conceded and finally dropped his eyes with a huff, turning his cheek towards Keith. It didn't matter to him anyway. It shouldn't matter to him. 

The three fell silent. Matt seemed to decide that this was his cue to cease his questions and turned on the radio instead. The car filled with some peaceful lo-fi hip hop played at a quiet volume. With a small sigh, Lance propped his elbow up on the window sill and gazed out of it, resting his chin in his hand. The cut on his cheek that he got yesterday stung when his fingers pressed against his cheek.

He focused on his reflection in the window and moved his fingers out of the way, inspecting the small injury. Even though he tried his best to cover it up, the sliver still showed faintly on his tan skin. He ran a thumb across its full length, the cut going all the way across his cheekbone in a small upwards arc. Lance frowned, moving back to his original position of resting his chin in his open palm. That was definitely going to leave a scar. He already had enough as it was, why did he have to get one on his face? 

Lance's eyes subconsciously roamed to the rear-view window where Matt's content face was in view. Even though Lance couldn't see his eyes through his sunglasses, he could tell that Matt's gaze was locked on the road as he expertly weaved through traffic. Lance took in the deep scar that he had on his left cheek. He wondered if he could pull off the cool, grizzled facial scar as good as he did. 

"Do I have something on my face?" Matt asked, breaking the silence and looking at Lance with a knowing smile. Lance chuckled in embarrassment, quickly averting his eyes. Crap, he got caught staring. Quick, make something up!

"No, I was just wondering about that infiltration mission on one of the main Galra headquarters, the one that happened a year ago. I was uh-" he hesitated to find the right wording. "-on a personal leave and wasn't recruited into Team Voltron yet. All I heard was that it was extremely successful and there were alot of Galran casualties," he finished, scratching the back of his neck awkwardly.

He really did wonder about that before, so he wasn't totally lying. Matt raised an eyebrow.

"Why don't you ask Agent Kogane over there, he was part of the main squad that broke through the ranks of the Galra." Matt used his head to gesture at Keith behind him, not wanting to take his hands off the wheel.

Keith made no signs that he intended to re-tell the mission, his face remaining indifferent. Abruptly, Matt quickly changed lanes and Keith was quite literally shaken out of his contemplative state. 

"What?" Keith looked up, blinking, as if finally realizing they were talking about him. 

"Baby Blue here asked about the famous raid mission on the Galra. The Alaskan one." Matt looked happy with himself for coming up with the nickname, Lance shook his head and smiled. 

"What about it?" Keith sat up, clearing his throat and brought his full attention to Lance. 

"Oh, uh-." He hadn't expected Keith to actually oblige his request. "I just wanted to know the general story." 

Keith shrugged a shoulder, "Not much to tell. A large group of around forty split into five groups, and we surrounded the building. My squad was assigned to storm the front entrance. Tech shut down all security and we raided the whole area, knowing that most of the troops that were supposed to be there had been deployed elsewhere for an attack of their own."

"What attack? I didn't hear about that," Lance said, eyebrows raised. He didn't even realize that he had subconsciously leaned in towards Keith as he was telling his story, and backed up a bit. Keith didn't notice. 

"Altea had a double agent on the inside. He relayed some false information to Zarkon that we had a base in Texas, so he poured a good portion of his resources into springing an attack there. He led Zarkon to one of our old HQ's that we left unoccupied for situations like those," Keith explained nonchalantly. Lance's jaw was nearly hanging open in shock. He didn't know why he was surprised, of course they would have thoroughly planned it out like that. An attack of that magnitude had to be carefully planned and executed.

"The rest was pretty easy. We broke in, killed everyone there, and stole all the information that we could. Surprisingly, we lost no one. Just some injured and one in critical condition." Keith's expression had relaxed completely now and he leaned back in his seat, propping his elbow up on the top of the middle seat. 

"Allura had a team sweep the place to make sure they didn't forget anyone, but you knew that already." 

"Led by Shiro, right?" Lance checked to make sure he was right. Keith nodded, a small smirk on his lips.

"He wasn't too happy to be in charge of the clean up crew, but Allura didn't trust anyone else to do it," he huffed a tiny laugh, recalling what happened. "You should have heard him try to talk her out of it. He looked so nervous.

Lance chuckled. It was hard to imagine the famous Shiro, Captain of Team Voltron, and Spymaster Allura's right hand man as scared. He couldn't blame the man, Allura was literally terrifying. He witnessed her put a huge dent in a metal desk with her bare fists. Not a woman you would want to fuck with.

"Damn, I wish I had been apart of that mission," Lance sighed dramatically. 

"Where did you go anyway?" Matt spoke up from the front after a while of just listening. "I know you were about to get promoted, if you had gone on that mission you probably would have made it on Team Voltron that much faster."

Lance froze up, his shoulders tensing and his back stiffening. "Oh," he covered up his discomfort with a small cough and a laugh, eyes flickering downwards. "Just family things, nothing exciting."

"I see," Matt said, focusing back on the road again as he turned off the highway and into a town area. Lance felt Keith's eyes on him, inspecting him. A moment passed and he finally looked away, giving Lance the chance to breathe.

Keith looked like he was about to say something, but when he opened his mouth he was cut off by Matt suddenly braking. Lance's body lurched forward against the seat belt, then he hit back again into his seat. There was a 'click' signalling the doors had unlocked and Matt turned around and waved an impatient hand.

"No time to chat, we're here now," he said, pressing another button that began to open their doors. Lance had to take a moment to sit still to make sure he didn't barf. Seriously, all the braking and turning was making him extremely nauseous. 

"Are you sticking around?" Lance asked Matt when finally gathered himself. He nodded, already bringing up his Altea issued laptop.

"Yeah, I decided I'd do the scans real-time to save Pidge the time of doing it herself," he said as he booted up the computer. 

Keith nudged Lance in the shoulder, stepping out of the car hastily. "Let's go, I want to get this done quick."

"Alright, alright, don't worry. We have all day." Now Lance knew why Keith wanted Matt to take them, to make things faster. 

Lance grabbed the backpack full of precious gear and got out of the car as well. He walked around to the back of the car and rested the bag on the trunk, unzipping it and taking out the two earpieces that were in it, handing the other one off to Keith. Lance placed the earpiece in his ear and pressed the small button in the middle to turn it on. It made a faint 'beep' sound, then there was light static of Keith getting his mic set up. 

"Testing, testing, one two three," Lance spoke aloud while he rummaged through the bag some more to fish out the rest of the gear. Keith gave him a nod beside him and turned on his own mic.

"Okay, we're good, let's go," Keith said on his right while the earpiece echoed his words inside his left ear. 

 _"Don't forget me, boys,"_ Matt's voice added in his ear, making Lance flinch in surprise. _"Remember, just place the scanners on each corner of the building and I'll-"_

Lance cut him off with a chuckle. "We know what to do man, we're not trainees anymore." He pulled out four black spheres that were the size of a quarter, each one with a red button on it. Keith took two of the balls from his hand and shoved them in the pocket of his leather jacket. 

 _"Just making sure,"_ Matt muttered, Lance could hear him already setting up on his end, typing out different commands on his keyboard.

Keith adjusted the collar of his jacket and looked up at the building they had to scan. They parked a bit farther down the street in the parking lot of a small convenience store to seem less obvious. Just ahead of them, next to a plaza of restaurants was a giant metal warehouse. The whole thing stuck out like a sore thumb among the dainty and modest establishments around it. Seemed like a place to hide illegal weapons.

"I don't want to be here for long, so let's get this-," Keith started but was cut off by a thunderous boom.

The ground underneath them shook as several more loud muffled explosions went off, each increasingly getting louder like they were coming towards them. Lance instinctively grabbed onto the first thing he could, which happened to be Keith. It felt like a series of bombs went of from right under their feet. A moment passed and the shaking stopped. 

 _"What was that?"_ Matt asked completely bewildered through their earpieces. Keith turned towards Lance, a look of surprise from the random detonations on his face. Lance suddenly realized that he was still holding on to him. He let go of his arm and looked over at the warehouse ahead. 

"Those were explosions. And it came from the exact building that we're about to enter." 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> do i really need to translate "Baka"? im pretty sure all of you know what that means, fucking WEEBS. but seriously, what would this fic be if i didnt end the chapter with some form of explosion/shot/death. y'all signed up for this shit.
> 
> gonna maybe try and do slightly shorter chapters so i can update more frequently. not a huge change, just go to like 3k words instead of my usual 4-5k words.
> 
> WOWIE! 4k+ hits! thanks y'all, ily but im gonna be THAT bitch and say "hey if you like this fic, make sure to send it to all your friends and your neighbour's cat to help spread this fic around." we're so close to 300 kudos too, im sooooooo-! also sorry if my responses to your comments are so recycled and repetitive, im surprisingly really uncreative. just know that i really am thankful for all of your amazing support, even if my response is the exact same as the comment above yours haha. anyways, time to copy and paste the usual spiel about my social media and shit, so here we go. love you guys.
> 
> follow me on [tumblr](http://arisushanti.tumblr.com/) and [instagram](https://www.instagram.com/arisushxnti/) !
> 
> i made an inspo playlist based off this fic, you can listen to it on spotify [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/omgitsreynaa/playlist/4VUPrPU9xlMItnQUQCNF0F?si=qyDRQd9jTXOY-WpPiZBAhQ)


	12. Boom, Baby

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> who knew it was possible to argue with your arms

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> as this fic goes on, the story gets more serious and the chapter summaries get more stupid. also, i have no idea how fancy spy technology works, so please bear with me and pretend that it makes sense.

Lance's hand twitched toward the glock he had tucked in the back of his pants. Why were things exploding underneath them? Usually it took a couple minutes of them being in a room for things to start blowing up. 

"We're not backing just because of some little explosion." Keith managed to shake himself out of his temporary moment of shock and was already back to his serious mode. 

"Excuse me, that was not ' _some little explosion'."_ Lance made air quotes with his fingers. "Those were several big explosions, directly under our feet. We haven't even done anything yet and things are already blowing up!"

"Doesn't matter if shit happens before or after we arrive. We still need to deal with it either way." Keith shrugged him off and began to make his way towards the ominous warehouse. Lance didn't really have a choice in the matter, so he quickly zipped up the backpack, put it over his shoulder, and followed Keith.

They walked along the sidewalk and passed by the small plaza of restaurants. The smell of food hit his nose, making him painfully aware of how empty his stomach was. Stupid Keith wanting to do everything immediately. He wished that they could have eaten breakfast first, at least. 

Matt's voice spoke up,  _"Judging from those explosions, I'm guessing that the warehouse has a pretty big basement if it could reach all the way to where we were parked."_

Keith hummed in response, scanning the building up and down with his eyes. "How deep?"

_"Maybe 20? 30 feet? Depends how big the explosion actually was, I can't really guess."_

"Are we going to get a reading on that basement too?" Lance asked. He hoped that they wouldn't have to, he didn't think that he'd have enough energy to fight if one did break out. 

"We're going to have to," Keith exhaled, shaking his head. "We need to take this opportunity and use it to its full extent."

"Fine, got it." Lance nodded, looking around. "Let's go in and around through the plaza."

He gestured to the line of restaurants to their right. Behind it was a small forested area that separated it from the busy highways, making perfect cover for them. Keith followed Lance's plan without a word, staying in front of him. The two crossed the small parking lot as casually as possible, and once they were hidden behind the walls of the buildings, they moved into the trees. 

Lance walked carefully, using all the stealth skills he acquired from being in the field to make his steps soundless. Keith did the same, leading the way down into a dip in the ground that put them directly behind the warehouse. The ditch was a couple feet deep, enough to give the two cover to kneel down and sort out a plan. 

Keith moved his hands and began to sign to him, his eyes never leaving the warehouse. _'_ _Here's what's going to happen. You stay here and watch both sides of the building for guards. I'll go in and plant the scanners on each corner.'_

 _'No way, you’re not getting all the glory for this!'_ Lance signed back, frowning. He knew this was going to happen. 

 _'Stop complaining, just do it.'_ Keith began to get up from his crouching stance and move up the small hill that provided him cover. Lance glared at his back and grabbed his arm, pulling him back. 

Keith literally hissed at him, yanking his arm out of Lance’s grip. “What?!” he asked in a harsh whisper. 

Looks like they were done yelling at each other in ASL. “Cameras.” Lance pointed up at the building and in the very top right corner, about 10 feet up and bolted right into the metal wall was a camera. The Galra weren’t that stupid to leave an important area with no security.

Keith followed his finger and stared up at it. His brows furrowed together in frustration. 

”Tech, can you deal with these cameras?” Keith asked, ducking back down behind the dip of the ditch. 

 _"Yeah it's done, just two seconds."_ Matt spoke, typing furiously at his keyboard. Keith turned to Lance.

"I'll plant the scanners, you watch my back," he said. Before Lance could even protest, Keith was already on his feet. 

"Shit!" Lance cursed as he watched Keith move in towards the wall. "Keit-!"

 _"Code names, Blue! Don't blow this for us!"_ Keith cut him off with a snap, quickly turning around again to face the rusted metal wall of the warehouse. 

Lance held his breath and nodded slowly. He almost forgot that he wasn't supposed to use any real names, in case someone managed to hack into their radio frequency and remove the audio modulation. He watched Keith reach the wall, and turn around to press his back against it, looking left and right. 

 _"Anything?"_ Keith asked in a low voice, looking over to him for a cue to continue. Lance stared him dead in the eyes, raising an eyebrow.

"Just a tiny idiot," Lance said sarcastically. Keith looked back and forth at the corners of the building in concern.

 _"What-?"_ His slow brain finally processed what Lance said and he sighed.  _"Very funny, Blue, you're hilarious."_

"That's my job," he chuckled and rolled his eyes. He waved his hand as a signal that it was all clear and Keith began to move to the right corner of the building. 

Keith pulled out the small black sphere from his pocket and bent down, attaching it to the very bottom corner of the warehouse. With the press of the red button, the LED on it began to blink rhythmically. 

 _"First beacon is in place. Tech, confirm the signal?"_ Keith said, waiting for a response next to the black beacon.

_"Locked on. Proceed, Red."_

"Impressive work," Lance remarked sarcastically. 

 _"Stop whining,"_ Keith retorted.  _"Is it clear?_

Lance sighed. It wasn't like they were doing anything particularly suspicious from the looks of it. He didn't really understand Keith's wariness. He still obliged and reluctantly checked each side of the warehouse to see if anyone was coming.  "Clear."

Keith nodded and made his way to the opposite corner of the building. Similar to the first one, he placed the scanner in the bottom corner and activated it with the simple press of the button. He waited patiently for Matt to confirm the signal was active, and when he did, Keith went back to his original crouched position next to Lance. 

"Now all we need to do is get the ones at the entrance and somehow get a reading on that basement," Keith said once he was beside him. 

"Well, we can't just walk through the front door to do that." Lance frowned at the warehouse and narrowed his eyes. "There has to be another entrance." 

 _"Can't help you guys until you get those last two beacons up,"_ Matt said. 

"You can do that then, Red. Let me look around a bit and find another way in." Lance handed him the two beckons he had and quickly stood up, dusting any dirt off of him.

 _"Fine, tell me if you find anything._ " Lance heard Keith let out a sigh through the comms as he went around the opposite side of the building to the front doors. 

Lance was thankful that Keith didn't argue with him over that. He went to the right side of the warehouse, running his hand along the rusted metal walls. This place was old, that's for sure, there had to be something he could use. His fingers moved up and down the corrugated indents of the outer wall, and Lance closed his eyes to focus on the feeling. There was a strange buzzing vibration he could feel, and it was getting stronger and stronger as he moved closer to the center of the wall. Maybe a machine of some sort?

He stopped walking when he reached the center point of the building. The vibrations were now at its strongest, a low humming sound reached his ears.

 _"All beacons in each corner, getting full scan now,"_ Matt said. Seems like Keith already finished his job.

Right on cue, Keith walked around the corner. "Did you find anything?"

Lance shoved his hand in his pants pocket. "Feel this."

"Feel  _what?"_ Keith asked skeptically, his eyebrows raised. Oh yeah, that probably sounded weird considering he wasn't holding the wall anymore.

Lance cleared his throat. "The wall, it's vibrating." To emphasize, he patted the rusted metal.

Keith complied and pressed his palm against it. "You're right. Tech, anything?"

 _"Don't know what's beyond that wall, but there are no people in the building, "_ Matt replied.  _"There's a small window above where you two are standing though."_

Lance looked up, and saw that there was in fact a window. Ten feet up and the size of a small child. He groaned. There was nothing around them that could help them climb, and the window sill was the only thing they could possible grab onto if they wanted to climb. Plus, Lance would never be able to fit through that window, and he sure as hell wasn't tall enough to reach it from there. 

"Any ideas?" Keith asked beside him, his arms crossed staring up at their only entrance. Lance turned to Keith and looked him over. An idea popped into his head.

He bent down and put a knee to the ground, kneeling in front of Keith. "Get on my shoulders." 

Keith blinked at him. "What?"

"Get on my shoulders, I'll boost you up!" he explained.

Keith scoffed, "No way."

"Come on, just do it, I promise I won't drop you!" Lance insisted.

"Blue, that window could only fit a toddler."

"Yes, exactly why you'd fit through just fine."

"Fuck you," Keith spat out.

"Come on, man," Lance pleaded.

"This is dumb."

"Do you have a better idea?"

Keith stayed silent and rolled his eyes, crossing his arms over his chest. 

"That's what I thought," Lance retorted. "Now get on my shoulders."

Keith seemed to consider it for a bit longer, narrowing his eyes at Lance in thought. After a moment he finally gave in, sighing.

"If you drop me, I will stab you in the leg," he threatened, jabbing a finger at him. Lance gulped nervously and gave him a reassuring thumbs up. He has had to learn the hard way that when Keith threatened to injure you, he was not joking.

Reluctantly, he stepped onto Lance's shoulder, his other leg following after. Slowly, Lance started to stand up. It took him a second to realize that he gravely underestimated Keith's weight by just judging him solely on his height. Keith was fucking heavy.  

Lance struggled a bit to get off his knees slowly, without toppling Keith over. He now wished that he didn't skip leg day as much as he did. Keith looked down, and when he saw Lance's concentrated face he chuckled.

"Having trouble down there, Blue?" he commented. Lance could hear the smirk on his face and he didn't feel like looking up to verify. He was quite preoccupied.

"Shut up, I didn't realize you were this fat," he shot back, finally getting to his feet properly. 

"This is all muscle, baby." Keith responded coolly, opening up the latch on the window. Lance couldn't help himself and flushed red. That was definitely not something that Keith normally said. Lance couldn't decide if he liked it or not.

He was about to say something, probably embarrassing, but Keith jumped off of his shoulders and fully grabbed onto the window sill, his forearms holding him up. Surprised, Lance stepped back from underneath him and watched as Keith dangled from the the ledge helplessly.

"Need some help?" Lance asked, amused. Keith grunted and let out a strained laugh.

"I'm fine." And with surprising amount of ease he pulled himself up and through the tiny space in one quick movement.

There was a muffled 'thud' noise and then Keith groaning through the comms. 

Lance snickered, "Rough landing?" 

Keith huffed.  _"Shut up, I'm opening the front door for you. Come quick, there's something."_

"Whatever you say, partner." Lance could literally  _hear_ Keith rolling his eyes at his words. 

Lance walked around to the front of the warehouse, and like promised, Keith had unlocked the door and was standing in the doorframe, arms crossed over his chest. Lance brushed past him casually and entered the room.

He didn't really know what he was expecting to see. Knowing the Galra, he imagined there to be some sort of evil lab with people floating in large tubes. But there was none of that. It was just a normal warehouse. Large metal containers lined the room evenly, some rows having more than one stacked on top of the other. Everything was dark, the only source of light coming from the small window that Keith initially entered through.

Lance approached one of the shipping containers and knocked on it experimentally. A hollow 'clang' sound followed and Lance stepped back with a frown.

"Should we check if there's anything in them?" he turned and asked Keith.

"Actually, I don't think there's anything in any of them," Keith responded, his eyebrows furrowing together as he scanned the containers. Lance raised an eyebrow in question.

"And what makes you say that?"

"Come look." Keith waved his hand and gestured for Lance to follow him. 

They made their way through the dark hallway-like spaces between the storage containers, barely any light from the window coming through. Soon, Keith led them all the way to the left side of the room, stopping right under the open window he came through. He pointed at the container under it and Lance followed his finger to look at it. He tilted his head.

"What?" Lance asked. "It's just a shipping container, like the rest."

"No, look at it." Keith went over and touched it, running his hand down the cool metal. "There's a space here, like a cut. Going all the way down."

Lance squinted, and sure enough there it was. It indeed looked like someone had cleanly chopped the container right through there, the cut going all the way down through the container, seperating it. Keith moved over and pointed at another similar cut that was a couple of feet from the first one. Now that Lance stood back and took it in, it looked like someone had just shoved two smaller containers on either side of the one in the centre. 

"And here." Keith rested his hand against a small circular groove on the container to the right. He moved his fingers away and Lance saw that the Galra symbol was scratched into it. "It's a button."

"Matt?" Lance asked hesitantly, backing away from it all. "Anything on what the fuck we're looking at?"

 _"Going from logic and what you've described, yes, I have an idea."_ Matt's voice said through his earpiece.

"Well?" Keith asked impatiently.

 _"Come on, it's obvious."_ Matt chuckled.

"Not to us, just tell us," Lance said impatiently. 

_"It's an elevator. You guys just found the secret enterance to the Galra's supposed underground lab."_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Keith: This is all muscle, baby ;)  
> Keith, internally: What the fuck did I just say holy shit fucking abort abort abort  
> Keith: *jumps through window in panic*  
> \--  
> for some reason this chapter took me so fucking long to write. i was just at the biggest block ever. idk. anyways this chapter is kinda bad but dw because the next chapter has some highly anticipated content in it ;) that's very vague but you'll see what I mean next week. 
> 
> anyways i don't have my computer with me so I can't copy and paste my social media links :(( guess I gotta do em by hand
> 
> oh yeah, and thanks for 5k+ hits and 350+ kudos! <3 if you like this fic you should definitely share it with all of your klance loving friends. even share it with your non-klance loving friends. send it to ur mum if you want. 
> 
> follow me on [instagram](https://www.instagram.com/arisushxnti/) and [tumblr](http://arisushanti.tumblr.com/)!
> 
> i have an inspo playlist for this fic listen to it on spotify [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/omgitsreynaa/playlist/4VUPrPU9xlMItnQUQCNF0F?si=cyMWMcwGT_aPO69MVrJUmQ)


	13. Down the Rabbit Hole

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> emotions are a fickle thing. memories resurge.

Lance ran his hand over the apparent doors of the elevator in front of him. Should they just go down it? What if there was a whole gang of Galrans down there? He wasn't really in the mood for a fight, he could feel his stomach growling in protest for lack of breakfast. All he wanted was some waffles to be honest.

"That makes things a bit easier." Keith shrugged beside him and instantly pressed the button. Lance shot him a panicked look as the button lit up purple and a low grumbling sound comes from the metal containers.

"Why would you do that?" Lance shrieked, looking around for a way to stop the doors from coming up. He may have just alerted whoever was down there that people were trying to get in. What if they come up to investigate? God, they were so going to have to fight their way out. Lance settled for desperately mashing the elevator button, in hopes that it would somehow stop it from coming up.

"What's wrong? We need to go down and check it out," Keith said innocently.

"What if there's people with big guns at the other side of those doors when they open? Ever think of that?" Lance replied with a sigh. Keith's mouth went into an 'o' shape as he finally realized what he just did. Uncharacteristically sheepishly, he scratched the back of his head in obvious embarrassment.

"Oh right," he murmured. 

Lance shook his head. Of course Keith would rush into things when it mattered most. That's just what he did. 

"Whatever, guess we're going to find out." Lance shrugged, finally grabbing the gun that he had safely tucked in his pants. Looks like he would use it today. 

"Wait, hang on, Matt can you scan for heat signatures?" Keith asked.

There was a bit of typing from Matt's end before he spoke up, " _I need a reading on the basement first."_ Keith sighed in exasperation.

Lance suddenly had an idea. "Wait, what about any cameras that are down there?"

 _"Smart. I'm already in their system, so yes I can."_ There's a silence for a couple of seconds as the pair wait for Matt to update them.  _"There are three cameras down there with only one being operational, the rest are offline for some reason. From what I can see in this small corner next to the elevator, there's no people."_

"At least we won't get instantly shot." Keith shrugged. 

"Great," Lance groaned. 

The low rumbling from the elevator came to a screeching halt and the hidden metal doors squeaked open. Lance whipped around at the sound, his hand going towards his back where his gun was placed. No one was in it, to his relief and he let out a sigh. He turned to Keith with a small shit-eating grin and gestured at the open doors in a dramatic bow. Keith stared at him blankly, rolled his eyes, and stepped into the elevator with heavy footfalls.

Lance waited a moment, in case there was some secret bomb waiting for them in the elevator, and once Keith made it very obvious that it was fine to enter by glaring at him, he walked in. As soon as he stepped foot inside, the doors squealed shut behind him, leaving the two alone and relatively trapped. 

Lance really didn't want to do this, but looking at Keith's determined face as he scanned the buttons in front of him made him think that this was really their only option. It was their job to investigate, and investigate they shall. He turned to the buttons next to the door that Keith was examining intently. The elevator shaft was quite dark, the singular fixture providing a dim and flickering light. It made Keith's intense face look that much darker with the strange shadows it cast on him. 

He only realized that he was staring at Keith when the other looked up curiously. "What is it?" Keith asked, clearing his throat in the process.

Lance quickly averted his gaze. "Nothing, I'm just wondering why there are so many floors. How big is this basement?"

Instead of Keith, Matt answered for him.  _"That's what I was thinking too. I'm looking at the blueprints for it that I managed to find and it's really weird."_

"How so?" Keith hovered his hand over every single button going down. Lance counted that there were thirteen of them, each the size of his thumb.

_"Well, this was originally designed to be a hidden government building to monitor gang activity, but it got abandoned halfway through construction."_

"Why?" Lance questioned.

_"Apparently, the whole area was deemed unsafe to build that kind of facility on by some architecture company. Doesn't specify why. There are twelve basement floors here."_

Lance squinted at his words. That didn't make any sense, there were thirteen buttons in the elevator. Why would there be more buttons here than in the original construction plans? Keith looked just as confused as Lance did. He was about to ask that exact question, when it finally all clicked.

"What was the name of that company that cancelled construction?" Lance asked. 

_"Er, it just says ED and co."_

Keith's eyes went wide. "Ebony Dragons. This is it, this is the place! The weapons have to be here if the Galra hired the Dragons to create a secret floor in an ex-government building!"

And before Lance could stop him, Keith slammed the button to the thirteenth floor. The LED around it lit up purple and the elevator began to descent. Lance turned to Keith with his jaw to the floor.

"What are you doing?! If this is really where the Galra are keeping part of their super weapon then we shouldn't just charge straight into it!" Lance cried, throwing his hands up in the air. They were so fucked.

"You don't get it, if we destroy these now then that will be one huge step into completing this mission!" Keith retaliated, taking a step towards him.

"What's the rush? We have so much time, and I would have liked to use that time to formulate a solid plan! Not run into things blind and get myself killed!" Lance mirrored Keith's movements and took a step closer as well. A part of Lance's brain registered Matt's voice slowly becoming static and eventually faded away, but he didn't care.

"I don't _want_ to waste time, Lance! I want to be done with... Everything!" he clenched his fists together and looked up at Lance straight on. "This mission! This situation! These people!"

Keith gritted his teeth together in anger, jabbing his finger against Lance's chest. When did they get so close to each other? He didn't care. 

Lance scoffed, "Oh, so that's what this is about?  _These people,_ fucking bullshit. You just don't want to be near me! God, you're so fucking selfish. I bet you don't even care how this fucking stunt will affect me, or anyone around you!"

Keith squeezed his eyes shut and turned his face away. He took a deep breath in and out, his voice coming out steady and low. "And if I said that was true?"

All Lance could see was red. Of course Keith hated him. He knew this all along, but hearing it actually said aloud was something else entirely. It was a cold splash of reality to the face. He had already expected for this conversation to take place eventually, while in bed lying awake during sleepless nights he would imagine how it would go down. But the one thing he didn't expect to happen was the tears that formed in his eyes. He couldn't tell if they were angry tears or sad tears, but they were there and they threatened to spill out. Lance clenched his fists tight and quickly wiped them away before Keith could see, taking in a deep breath.

"I would say that I'm not surprised, Red. All you care about is the mission, you don't give a shit if it ends up killing your partner," Lance spat out. Keith didn't meet his eyes, only turning away from his glare to watch as the elevator doors opened up.

"We'll talk about this later, just-" Keith started quietly, but Lance cut him off.

"-just focus on the mission, yeah, I got it." Lance pulled out his glock and held it up, pointing it at the slow opening doors. Keith silently slipped one of his knives from up his sleeve and gripped it in his hand, glancing to Lance at his side. 

With a low creak, the doors came to a wide open stop and Lance surveyed the area. The place was dark, all the lights were blown out and glass riddled the floor. The elevator had opened up to a narrow hallway that turned to the right, probably into the actual lab. The air was thick with smoke, stinging his eyes when he stepped out into the hallway. The walls were solid metal, which is probably why they couldn't get a signal out. He slowly progressed onwards.

Lance looked back at Keith behind him. He couldn't make out much of his facial expression, but he could tell that he was serious.

 _'I don't hear anything,'_ Lance signed to Keith. 

 _'It's too quiet,'_ Keith agreed, moving forward to press his back against the left wall.

 _'We've got no signal in here, let's just turn off our comms.'_ Lance pressed a button on his earpiece and the light buzz of static shut off. Keith did the same.

Lance moved quietly to the space next to Keith on the wall and waited as Keith quietly peaked around the corner.

 _'I see no one, but everything is blown up.'_ Keith turned back around to face Lance.  _'Lots of fire.'_

 _'No shit, there were multiple explosions, of course things are on fire.'_ Lance signed aggressively. Just because they had to be serious and focused, doesn't mean that he was going to forget that Keith basically said he didn't care if he died.

Keith frowned and his expression hardened into a glower. He gave Lance a glare and immediately rounded the corner into the room to spite him. Lance sucked in a breath of air and pursed his lips together. God dammit.

Lance followed Keith in hastily, gun aimed up in front of him. He only managed to take three steps forward before he was running into Keith's still form. 

Lance grunted, stepping backwards. "What?" he walked around Keith to stand next to him.

Keith's face was full of concern, eyebrows furrowed together,and his arms hanging loose at his sides. Confused, Lance followed his gaze to look at the scene in front of him and he almost gagged.

Fire. There was fire everywhere. Metal tables and the contents that used to be on it were completely ablaze. Whatever the place used to be, it was completely destroyed now. A large divot was blown into the stone floor, stretching in a messy straight line all the way through the whole room.Bits of the floor layed in different sized chunks all around, most blackened with soot. Scorch marks and ash covered every surface that could be seen. 

All of this destruction, but the worst and most gruesome part of it all was what was laying right in front of their feet. A bloody hand that looked like it was completely torn off from its original body. Its wrist bone exposed and sharp where it was blown off with its charred flesh red with blood and the edges black with ash.

Bodies were littered everywhere. Odd limbs lay detached from its torso, palms opened up to face the heavens. Lance now realized that the odd splatters of liquid along the walls was the blood of the people who fell victim to the blasts. They were looking at a war scene.

Lance was frozen still, staring down at that bloodied hand and suddenly he was back in that sandy deserted town. Gunfire around him, blasts in every direction. The smell of metal and gasoline hitting his nose, forcing him to pull his bandanna up to the bridge of his nose. Screams of terror in languages he didn't understand reached his ears, but he couldn't understand any of it. Lance watched the chaos from his high perch, rifle in hand and enemies in his sights. He could see everything. He could hear everything. He had to  _watch_ everything.

He took shot after shot, and he hit shot after shot. When he saw each purple decorated soldier fall it inspired a sickening satisfaction in his heart that he hated himself for. Every time he saw people coming for him, he would move positions, choosing another high hill to watch from or another tall tower to see from. The words of his captain played in his head over and over again.  _Kill everything that we can't kill. You are our protector and their worst nightmare. And if they get a hold of us, you know what you have to do._

And eventually, it came time to do what he had to do. They had got them, and the feeling of helplessness from that time with his father settled in again. He moved his sights from the enemy to his own captured friend. He remembered everything. Every movement, every breath he took. It was etched into his memory and into his body. 

He couldn't move, he couldn't breathe. A high pitched ringing came to his ears, he couldn't hear.

"Lance." A tentative hand tapped his arm and was bringing him out of the depths. Lance blinked, suddenly realizing where he was and what he was doing. He turned to Keith slowly, doing his best to shake away the fogginess in his brain. Keith looked almost worried at Lance's state.

"Sorry, I was just surprised. It won't happen again," Lance said, voice coming out steady again. Keith looked him up and down, hidden concern written on his face.

"Are you sure?" he asked after a long time. There was hesitancy in his voice when he asked the question.

"I'm fine," Lance insisted, a bit more aggressive than he should have been. He didn't miss the wistful look Keith had on his face when he turned around to face the sight in front of him. 

"I'm guessing the explosives were in the ground where that dip in the floor is," Keith said after a beat, shaking himself out of any emotion and becoming apathetic once again. Lance still recognized some agitation in his movements. "The question is-"

"Why were there charges in the floor and why did they go off?" Lance finished for him. That was something he had been wondering as well. The explosives had to have been put there on purpose, but why? It made no sense.

"Nothing makes sense," Keith said, reading Lance's mind. "Why would they blow up this lab if it was so valuable?"

He didn't know. Lance took a small step forward into the room. There had to be something he wasn't getting. He had to think. Secret hidden underground lab, valuable research and potential weapons being created, bombs built in the floor, bombs exploded, people were still in it. People were still in it? 

Everything clicked in his head as he pieced together what happened. "Us. It was us," Lance said to his horror. "They knew we were coming."

"What do you-?" Keith began to ask, but then he understood as well. "The phone."

The phone they stole from that Galra man had the three addresses in it. Lance had brought it with them in the backpack, the one he had on his back right now. Someone tracked the location of the phone and waited for them be in the location. He did this. He stupidly brought that damn phone and now he was in this damn basement surrounded by dozens of bodies.

"God, they knew we were coming and blew the place up to hide the evidence and kill us!" Lance said, feeling breathless. The bombs went off when they were right over the basement. They must have thought they were in it, not over it. He assumed that the person who set off the charges was not at the site, or else the two of them would be dead already.

"Shit," Keith cursed, biting his lip. "We don't have much time, we should still search for any information here."

Lance gave him a grave and reluctant nod. As much as he hated to stay there longer and hated to listen to him, Keith was right. Things were already on fire, and the fact that they had the phone with them the whole time means that the Galra know they are alive and moving. It wouldn't be long before they sent someone to finish the job, and he was in no mood for a fight right now. Not in this place. 

With no more complaints, he moved forward and farther into the destroyed lab. Long metal tables were toppled over on the ground, some destroyed and some with large dents in them. Remnants of paper and glass vials lay on the cold stone, either on fire or completely shattered. Lance noticed one sheet of paper that was relatively salvaged behind a turned over table and picked it up. The corner was a bit singed but other than that it was totally fine. There was a diagram of a human on it with random notes made about certain body parts in symbols he didn't recognize. It wasn't in any language that existed. Most of the notes were made near the head of the person, something to do with the brain. Lance put it in his backpack to let Pidge scan and decipher what it meant later.

A bit farther down there were some computers that lay destroyed on the floor, most of them having caught flame too. There was nothing that was intact. Everything was destroyed. The Galra were smart to put a fail safe like this in places with sensitive information, they seemed to have learned from the raid. He walked some more and rummaged through some ashes until he decided that there was nothing for him to gather, and started going back to Keith.

On the opposite wall there were a couple of wooden doors that had been blasted open, inside were giant metal tanks filled with what he presumed was some sort of liquid or gas. Of course, inside the room things were on fire, some of it slowly creeping toward the tanks. He'd look into that later. Keith was standing in front of one of the doors to the rooms that had surprisingly stayed standing during the blasts, this one was made of metal. He went to his side and crossed his arms over his chest to stare at the door with him.

"What the fuck are you doing, there's nothing left to do here," Lance snapped at him. Keith ignored his attitude, staring at the metal door with a frown.

"I'm trying to figure out how I can get this open, it's locked." To emphasize his point, Keith reached forward and jiggled the handle to show that it was, in fact, locked.

"Have you tried this?" Lance stood in front of it, brought his leg up, and kicked. The lock broke easily and the door swung open. Keith stood shocked, and Lance smirked in victory, walking right past him. 

Similar to the previous rooms, there were two large tanks against the farthest wall, pipes connected the contents of the tanks to the ceiling. The only difference is that a table sat in the middle of the room with different folders on it.

Lance instantly went over to the table, grabbing the first folder he could get his hands on and started flipping through the contents, Keith doing the same next to him. It was in English. Most of the stuff written was scientific nonsense that went right over his head, so he looked at the pictures instead. Each page showed a picture of a man who seemed unconscious and was standing in some sort of container or pod. As the reports went on, the body of the man started to become more mutilated and large beyond proportion. He flipped to the most recent report and was shocked to see that his face was almost unrecognizable. He had grown almost two feet and his arms were incredibly muscular and long, the length reaching almost all the way down to his ankles. It looked like a monster. 

"Human experimentation?" Lance asked in partial horror, dropping the folder on the table.

"I know," Keith let out a breath, setting his own folder down. It looked like each folder represented a different test subject. Keith's had a woman who's arms had grown sickeningly long and their nails look like claws. "We should take all of these back."

Keith grabbed each folder, there were eight in total, and shoved them into Lance's backpack. As he did that, Lance looked curiously at the large tanks in front of him. What was in it? Quintessence maybe? Before Keith was even able to zip up the backpack fully, Lance was walking forward to inspect.

"Woah, hey!" Keith said in surprise as Lance basically lurched forward in curiosity. The label on one of the tanks was missing and the other had collected a large amount of dust. He reached up and with a tentative hand, he wiped away the grime. 

 _O2._ Oxygen tanks. That made sense considering they were really far underground, they might need some extra air to breathe down there. He was about to pay no attention to it, until he suddenly remembered. The other rooms, the other tanks,  _the fire._  

Lance's eyes widened and he whipped around, grabbing Keith by the arm to run out of the room. Of course, Keith didn't budge and stood there confused.

"What is it?" he asked, trying to remove Lance's grip on Keith's arm, but Lance was already dragging him out of the room. He got him all the way to the corner that turned to the elevators when Keith wrenched his arm away from him.

"What?!" Keith shouted, pissed off at getting tugged around. Lance was frantic.

"Oxygen tanks. Fire.  _Run!"_ he yelled and pushed Keith toward the exit. At first, he was still confused, refusing to move, until he processed Lance's words in his head. But at that point it was too late. 

In the exact split second that Lance began to reach out, the fire had reached the tanks and it was exploding into pieces. Everything was in slow motion. The initial explosion sparked a chain reaction among all of the tanks and suddenly all of the rooms were exploding fire and metal shards outwards into the main lab. Lance opened his arms wide and tackled Keith to the ground, putting them around the corner and a couple of feet away from the room. Then, he shut his eyes and waited for the inevitable. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lance: *kicks open door and smirks at keith*  
> keith, internally: fuck fuck fuck, im gay. im GAYYYY!  
> ~~~  
> i really did consider adding some nice sweet fluff. i really did. but then i realized that i can just add death and gore instead! i swear to god, there will be some progression with klance's relationship. i've been getting some complaints about how there's 50k words but nothing happening romance wise. for those who did complain: do not fret, my child. i would describe the progression of their relationship as a bomb with a lit fuse. no pun intended and interpret that as you wish.
> 
> but to be real, this chapter was fucking horrendous to write. it was so god damn hard. writing out all those emotions like what was in this chapter is pretty difficult for me, so woops. also it doesnt help that i got some writers block while writing (arguably) one of the most suspenseful chapters posted. so sorry about that, ive been trying to learn ways to stay motivated and to keep a constant flow of ideas coming in! (fun fact: your comments are the biggest motivators and ways to get ideas so be sure to do that <3) 
> 
> also for mood music you can listen to Arsonist's Lullaby by Hozier and/or Eyes on Fire by Blue Foundation while reading the basement scene. that's what i was listening to while writing it. 
> 
> follow me on [tumblr](http://arisushanti.tumblr.com/) and [instagram](https://www.instagram.com/arisushxnti/) !
> 
> i made an inspo playlist based off this fic, you can listen to it on spotify [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/omgitsreynaa/playlist/4VUPrPU9xlMItnQUQCNF0F?si=qyDRQd9jTXOY-WpPiZBAhQ)


	14. Cliff's Edge

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> and when the dust settles, it's just you and i.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> for extra OOF listen to lovely by billie eilish ft. khalid during this chapter. have fun :) made this chapter with you guys in mind <33

This was how he was going to die. Right here, right now. He knows that he has said that a lot in the past, but that's because he's been in alot of near death situations in the past. This one included. And this one by far, is the worst way to go out of all of them. He was going to die while protecting this asshole. 

Lance tackled Keith to the ground and time sped up around him again. As the two hit the ground, a large  _'boom'_  shook the entire basement, rumbling the floor and causing an avalanche of dust to fall on them. Lance did his best to protect Keith from the blast and pressed himself against him like a shield. His back started to heat up and he hoped to God that he wasn't on fire. The explosion settled and Lance was left breathless, aching all over and head spinning.

Slowly, he opened his eyes and the first thing he saw through the smoke were Keith's stunning eyes. He was breathing hard, and his eyes were blown wide open in shock. Looking at him carefully, Lance noticed that his eyes were not actually black, but a deep, dark purple. He has never seen that before. How could he have not noticed that?

 _"Whoa,"_  Lance murmured out loud, staring down at him. Keith's shocked expression now focused in on Lance. His mouth opened and closed multiple times, like he wanted to say something but decided against it, and stopped himself at the last second.

Lance must have been dreaming. That's it. The entire room was now completely thick with smoke, making it so he could only see two feet in front of him. His head was pounding and he just realized he couldn't hear anything from the high pitched tone in his ears. Maybe he died and went to heaven, and in there Keith had really pretty eyes that he never noticed before. 

"Am I dead?" Lance croaked out, but he couldn't hear the words being said, only felt that he was saying them. Keith did the same thing where he opened his mouth and closed it over and over again, this time his face was a little red while doing it. Wait, or was he actually speaking?"

The ringing faded away and the last bit of Keith's words came in. "-but we need to go, so, if you could get off of me that would be great," he said apologetically.

Lance frowned. He just saved this man's life and all he had to say was for him to get off? Lance obliged and sprung to his feet quickly, which was a very bad decision. As soon as he began to stand up, a sharp pain went through his entire body and he was back on the floor again, sucking in a painful breath. Keith reacted instantly to his outcry and knelt down in front of him.

"What happened?" he asked lightly, but when he looked down his face fell. Lance looked down at himself at where Keith was looking and winced. A thin, sharp, sliver of metal that was about the size of his entire hand was embedded into the back of his calf. Another piece of metal, a short rod this time, pierced the bottom right side of his back, just managing to hit him instead of the backpack that he had on. Keith analyzed the damage.

"That rod didn't pierce through you, so I'm going to keep it in until we get out of here. But I'm going to have to take out that sheet of metal because it's completely rusted," Keith explained quickly. He reached around Lance and took the backpack off his back, rifling through it to pull out a white t-shirt. He instantly ripped the bottom half of the shirt off so it was a strip of cloth, and laid it next to him.

"Do it, this place is literally coming down around us." As Lance said that, a piece of the stone ceiling next to them broke out and fell an inch from Keith's hand. The basement seemed to have been stable enough to take the initial first explosions, but not this second one. He guessed that they had less than 15 minutes before they were completely buried in rubble. Shitty way to die #2. 

Keith grabbed his knife from his jacket and cut into Lance's jeans, removing all the cloth from the knee downward. Next, he moved his hand and held onto Lance's calf, the other hand gripping onto the rusted metal embedded in his leg. "Ready?" he asked, looking into his eyes for confirmation.

Lance chuckled bitterly. "I've been through worse, Kogane, and you know that. Just do it." He turned his head away so he wouldn't have to look at his leg.

"Alright." Keith placed his hand steady on Lance's calf, holding it down around the area where the injury was. Then slowly, he began to pull it out. Lance winced in pain, his expression going taut, but he made no sound. An agonizing two seconds later, it was out and Lance heard the audible _'clink'_ of the metal shard dropping to the floor. Blood instantly began to pour out from the cut, but Keith was quick to make sure he bandaged the wound, immediately grabbing the strip of t-shirt he ripped up earlier. Carefully, he wrapped the cloth around Lance's calf, tying it off tightly. 

Once Lance felt that he was done, he began to stand up. "We need to hurry up," he coughed out. The smoke was thickening and the dust in the air from the crumbling ceiling was filling his lungs. He got to his knee and tried to stand, but as soon as he put pressure on his leg it instantly gave in on him. Keith was swift to stand up and catch him, slipping his arm under Lance's to support him. 

"Stop, you're going to bleed out more if you overwork your leg." Keith's voice was raspy. He grabbed Lance's arm and put it around his shoulders, having his own arm wrap around Lance's back to press his torso against his. 

He made no protests and was glad for the extra support. Together, they limped slowly toward the elevator, every step sending spikes of electric pain up his entire right side. They were almost to the elevator doors when Lance's vision began to spot and he stumbled forward. Keith caught him again and tightened his hold around his torso.

"We're almost out just a little bit further, Blue," Keith said reassuringly. Lance nodded weakly and let Keith practically drag him to the elevator doors.

With every movement he made, he could feel the rod in his back shifting slightly, sending excruciating pain across his whole body. It almost made him forget about the gash on his leg. He could feel that he was already bleeding through his makeshift bandages that Keith made. His leg throbbed terribly, but it wasn't nearly as bad as the throbbing in his skull. Lance let his head drop down in front of him. He would just rest for a few seconds, everything was fine.

"McClain, stay with me!" Keith's voice yelled, but it just echoed in his ears. He shut his eyes and instantly felt better. Maybe he could just stay like this. 

Lance's body lurched forward and he went tumbling to the ground. Thankfully, Keith supported him just enough so he wouldn't completely topple over, and instead he leaned against the wall right next to the doors. 

"Come on!" Keith cried out desperately, pressing the elevator button rapidly. There was the sound of rumbling and Lance heard Keith let out a sigh of relief. It was a miracle that the damn thing was even working.

"McClain, you need to get up, we're going to get buried fifty feet down if you don't." Keith's words bounced around in his head. He knew he needed to get up, but everything just hurt so fucking much. His entire body ached, even a simple breath caused a spike of pain

"Fuck..." he muttered.

Keith tilted his head to the side and leaned in towards him. "What?"

"This fucking hurts," he said weakly. Keith shook his head.

"You're going to be fine, trust me," he insisted desperately. "Now come on, you need to stand up."

Keith wrapped his arms around Lance again, and with all his strength he pulled him up. Lance hissed. They stood in front of the elevator doors patiently, the basement getting more unstable as the seconds ticked by. Suddenly, the low rumbling stopped, just short of where they were and the elevator became silent. Keith slammed the button frantically, but nothing happened. 

"Fuck!" he cursed, slamming his free fist against the closed doors. 

"Keith..." Lance groaned out, his head slumping downwards again. "Don't bother..."

"What?" Keith asked breathlessly. "Don't say that, I can just get this door open, everything will be fine."

"Then what..? I can't climb, I'm fucking impaled right now." Lance's breath's were short. He hated this. He hated getting hurt. He hated being a burden. He hated seeing Keith try so hard to help him when he's useless. He hated it all.

"We'll find a way, now wait here, I'll be back," he said quickly and ran off towards the collapsing lab. Lance didn't have the energy to stop him. 

A minute passed, and Keith came running back. He had a metal bar the size of his arm that was melted and flattened at the end. Without wasting any time, he shoved the flattened end in between the doors and wrenched it to the side, pushing with all the strength he had. Surely enough, the door cracked open and Keith pried it open all the way. The elevator car was halfway down, leaving just enough room for the two to crawl through the space at the top. 

"Come on, McClain, let's go!" Keith said, rushed. 

"Keith," Lance said quietly.

"Don't you dare say it."

"You need to leave me here," he finished, his voice barely above a whisper.

"No! I won't!" Keith yelled, moving to stand in front of him and grip his shoulders.

"You'll be fine, you'll make it out easy-"

"I'm not leaving you here," Keith spoke over him, gripping his shoulders and trying to bend down to look at his face. 

"-pass on the information and attend the gala.. I doubt you would even need to go to that stupid party, you'd find out the locations before then-..." Lance paused to cough. Another piece of stone ceiling behind them crumbled and fell to the ground. He could feel the heat on his back growing, meaning the fire was spreading to around the corner.

"Lance, please..." Keith said, almost pleading. 

"It's fine, Kogane.. You'll get what you always wished for.. Peace.. Some god damn quiet for once..." Lance chuckled bitterly, but the laugh quickly turned into a cough. He had to focus on staying awake, but black spots kept appearing in his vision. 

"No! That's not what I want, I didn't say that!" Keith shouted at him, hands gripping his shoulders tighter.

"You'll be fine... Great, actually... Now, hurry up and go.. This place won't hold forever." Lance smiled weakly at the ground.

"No, you're wrong!" his voice sounded strained and his expression was painful. He was gripping his shoulders so hard, Lance thought that he might bruise.

"Finish the mission, Keith, you can do this." 

I can't! I can't do this without you!" his voice broke at the end, and his grip on his shoulders loosened. Keith let go of his shoulders and let his arms drop to his sides. Then, he spoke in a voice so quiet that it was barely heard over the chaos behind him.

_"I need you, Lance."_

Lance froze up and opened his eyes. He slowly brought his head up to look at Keith in front of him. They were close. He could see the lines on his forehead creasing as Keith looked at him with desperation and fear. The fire raged on behind him and Lance could hear the crackling all around. Keith's complexion was a soft orange from the light of the fire that was cast on him, making him look like he was glowing.

Now that Lance payed more attention, he looked incredibly tired and weary. Sweat dripped down the side of his face and there  was a blotch of ash on his left cheek. The dark ash contrasted against his unnaturally pale face and Lance felt the overwhelming urge to fix that.

Without thinking, he slowly brought his hand up and placed his palm against the side of his face. Keith's gaze flickered up to meet his and Lance saw that his eyes were glassy. He blinked quickly and whatever was in his eyes was gone. Lance gave him a weak smile, swiping his thumb gently across his cheek to wipe the ash off. Keith let his eyes flutter close and his hands ghosted over Lance's waist. They stayed in that position for a while, both of them knowing what needed to be done. 

_You know what you have to do. Soldier's duty, McClain._

It had to come down to this kind of thing eventually. Death was something he was used to by now. It was always around him, and most of the time it was caused by his own hands. He had come to terms with the fact that he'd die one day. He had also come to terms with the fact that when he died, it would probably be painful and slow. A sacrifice. 

Sacrifices were always made during wars. He imagined that he might have to sacrifice himself for the greater good or for somebody else. He was willing to die. It was his job, his duty. He was fine with it, more than fine actually.

But in that moment, feeling the heat everywhere, the place crumbling down around him, and the person right in front of him, he realized something. He didn't want to die. 

"It can't end like this," he choked out. Keith's eyes flickered open and he blinked up at him, almost realizing what was happening around him. 

"We can get out of here. We can't give up."

"But how?" Lance asked, looking around. He may have gotten a newfound boost of energy, but he could still barely walk, and the elevator was broken. He had to think of nothing. He refused to die here. He can't. He won't. 

"We would have to get on top of the elevator car and climb up the shaft. But-," Keith started, but Lance finished his sentence for him.

"-I can't climb..." Lance trailed off. What could they do? He had trouble thinking, he couldn't get a hold of a coherent thought. His mind was a puddle, and the fact that he was slowly bleeding out wasn't helping. 

"Let's not worry about that yet, we need to get out of this basement first," Keith said. He was right, the fire was slowly creeping towards them and it wouldn't be long before a piece of ceiling finally fell on top of their heads. 

"I'm going to climb in there first, then I'll pull you up." Keith moved to the elevator car that had a space at the top. He jumped and grabbed onto the edge of the floor that peaked out, pulling himself up and through the space. He bent down from inside the elevator and lent his hand. 

Lance took in a deep breath. This shit was going to hurt. He took Keith's hand generously and used his other hand to pull himself up. He managed to get his chest in the car, but he was already about to pass out.

"Shit!" Lance yelled, as he haphazardly crawled up onto the floor. If he wasn't losing blood before, he was definitely losing some now. The moving around had caused his leg to bleed out more, a steady stream pouring down his leg. Keith helped him stand up.

"We're not out of the woods yet," he warned, looking up. It was almost pitch black in the elevator, Lance could barely see a thing. Either that, or he was already beginning to black out.

Keith began to get to work, looking up at the ceiling to see if there was any sort of opening, going on the tips of his toes to feel along. "Hang on."

Lance barely made out Keith's fingers run across the top of the car, before they stopped as he felt something. He moved to reposition himself under whatever he had just found, and reached his hands up, gripping onto some sort of rectangle and pulling it down. The hatch opened surprisingly easily, swinging downwards and off, hitting the floor. Keith turned to Lance, offering his hand. 

"It's a bit high, I'll boost you up," Keith said, getting down on one knee and holding his hands out in a ready position. If Lance had the energy to spare, he would have laughed. He was the one who helped Keith into this mess, and Keith was the one getting him out of it. 

Instead, he smiled, which ended up as more of a wince. "Get ready to do a lot of pushing and boosting, Kogane."

"I got you."

Lance gingerly brought his injured leg up onto Keith's knee and as quickly as possible, pushed himself up so his other leg was in Keith's grip. Carefully, Keith started pushing Lance up by his single leg, and Lance reached up to grab the edge of the open hatch. He managed to get his elbows above and placed securely on the top of the elevator car, with only a small hiss of pain coming from him. But now came the hard part that.

Lance mustered all the strength he could, and started pulling himself up. Pain exploded over the lower right part of his back, the injury screaming to his body in protest. It was so intense, Lance almost let go of his grip, but Keith steadied him from underneath. 

"Come on, Lance." Keith pushed him up more abruptly. 

He groaned. Using up the rest of the strength he had in his body, he pulled himself up and all the way through the ceiling hatch, collapsing on top of it. His mind was getting more fuzzy, his muscles ached, his leg throbbed, and his back had a fucking pole in it. He was going to die. 

A low grunt and the sounds of two feet being planted firmly on the top of the elevator car signalled to Lance that Keith had made it on top as well. Keith said something to him, but it muddled together in Lance's brain. 

"-up!" Keith said again, sounding urgent. A hand grabbed his bicep and helped pull him to his knees, but that's all he could do. 

Keith's panicked expression came into view, but it looked much darker and blurry. He felt cold. Why was it so cold up there? Is it because he's away from the fire right now? The fire. That's right. They needed to get out now. Right now. 

Lance said something, but even his own words were a mystery to him. Everything was so confusing. Keith dropped his arm and Lance let it dangle at his sides. 

"-att!!" Keith's voice said. All of a sudden, the world turned. What was going on? All Lance could see were Keith's legs, but they were sideways. The cold metal of the elevator car touched his cheek. What?

Lance looked down at his collapsed form. A pool of dark liquid formed underneath his legs. This was bad. He couldn't pass out right now, he needed to stay awake. He still wasn't out yet. They still weren't out yet. 

"-ome in!"

He could not pass out. He needed to stay awake. 

"-need help!" 

He could not pass out. He needed to stay awake.

"-please!"

Lance's eyes began to flutter. 

"-very injure-!"

No, no, no. Stop it. Open your eyes. 

"-omething to climb wi-."

Black dots danced in his vision, obscuring almost everything.

"-ank God-!"

Fuck, fuck, fuck. No. No!

"Lance!" 

He hadn't even realized his eyes were closed, until he opened them again. Through his haze, he saw Keith's face. He was saying something, but he couldn't make it out. He looked relieved. That made Lance feel relieved. 

"-be okay."

The last thing Lance saw was a rope being dropped down from somewhere above and Keith's grateful expression. Then, everything went dark and cold. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> idk if I like this or not. was it too much? I don't know. originally wasn't planning on having it be THIS intense, but on the plane back I decided "hey why the fuck not, y'all deserve this right now." and just poured in all the angst I could. looks like keithy boy actually does care, hm? I wonder why he's so adamant on getting Lance out, when he would normally do what he had to do to keep the mission going. interesting...
> 
> also don't @ me, I have no idea what it feels like or looks like to pass out from severe blood loss. 
> 
> and SORRY THIS WAS LATE! I just came back from my two week long trip to L.A. and it was really fun! Hurray, for west coast! 
> 
> Anyways, YTFM is back, and I have provided. But I request, please don't come at me through my inbox or tumblr dm's if a chapter is late! I've been pretty diligent on updating fairly consistently over the course of this fic, so getting some passive aggressive comments really didn't help. but it's okay, I understand how y'all feel so it didn't bother me that much.
> 
> follow me on [tumblr](http://arisushanti.tumblr.com/) and [instagram](https://www.instagram.com/arisushxnti/) !
> 
> i made an inspo playlist based off this fic, you can listen to it on spotify [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/omgitsreynaa/playlist/4VUPrPU9xlMItnQUQCNF0F?si=qyDRQd9jTXOY-WpPiZBAhQ)
> 
>  
> 
> edit: I deadass lost 8 subs for delaying this chapter by a week, I hate everything.


	15. A Break from the Chaos

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the chapter title is very literal. the boys take a break and discuss some things.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i kinda like telling you guys what songs i listened to while writing, since it gives a bit of context to the mood of the chapter. anyways here they are:
> 
> dua lipa - thinkin' bout you  
> arctic monkeys - i wanna be yours
> 
> (you can find them on my ytfm spotify playlist, linked in the end notes)

Lance has been injured many times in his career. It was basically a given. He has been shot, stabbed, shot again, stabbed some more, even set on fire once. He was unfortunately used to it by now. But the one thing that majorly sucked about his current situation now, was the fact that he couldn't lie down on his back.

Lance slowly began to come-to, eyes cracking open slightly as he slowly began to adjust to the light. The first thing he realized, was that he was lying down on his stomach, his legs awkwardly dangling in the air from the lack of leg room. He seemed to be on a couch. His eyes darted around the room in panic. Where was he? What was going on? The last thing he remembered was climbing on top of that elevator car and passing out, so how did he get here? Was he dead?

Rushed, he started pushing himself off of his stomach, when suddenly an explosion of pain surged through him. Right, he was almost impaled through the back by a rod. How could he forget? His head was pounding and through his hazy daze, he looked down at the floor and saw that it was a fluffy white carpet. Wait...

A voice spoke from the next room, slowly approaching his lying form. "Don't move so fast. You're hurt."

He wasn't going to pretend like he didn't instantly know who it was by their footsteps alone. It was Keith.

"Are we in the hotel room?" he rasped, still hurting from when he tried to get up.

"You know we can't go to hospitals." Keith said, walking in from the kitchen, a glass in hand. 

Lance knows that they weren't supposed to. Hospitals ask too many questions. They are too open and accessible. Any person with decent lying skills could get into one of their rooms and assassinate them while the other partner is in the washroom or fast asleep. Plus, they were all trained in emergency first aid and some basic surgical skills, so they never really needed hospitals anyways.

Keith stopped in front of Lance, surveying his form for a moment, before setting the glass down on the small coffee table in front of him. "You should drink some water."

"If only I could sit up," Lance groaned out. All of his limbs felt so stiff from lying down in that awkward position, for who knows how long. Also, the fact he was practically impaled earlier.

He made a second attempt to sit up, pushing his body up slowly at first, but the pain came through just the same. He hissed and winced.

"Hang on." Keith went up to him and looped his arm under Lance's, assisting in lifting him up. Finally, Lance managed a sitting position that didn't have his back and calf burning. When he looked down at himself, he found that he was shirtless and only wearing shorts. It was understandable, to make changing the bandages on his back easier. Just because he understood why, doesn't mean it made him any less uncomfortable and vulnerable.

"Thanks," he mumbled out to Keith, who gave a small nod in return. Lance began to reach over to his glass on the table, but Keith held his hand out and stopped him.

"I'll get it," Keith insisted. Lance was secretly thankful, because his body ached like hell every time he shifted the slightest bit. He grabbed the glass from off the coffee table and handed it to him, afterwards moving around the table to sit on the couch next to Lance. 

Lance took it gratefully, chugging the entire glass way quicker than he intended. After finishing it, he took in a breath and sighed. That hit the spot. His time down in that hot basement really had him de-hydrated. Keith took the glass from his hands and set it back down on the table.

"How long was I out?" Lance asked. He guessed it was less than a day, because Keith still looked fatigued. Although, it did look like he took a shower at lest.

"About six hours. How are you feeling?" he asked in a casual tone, as if he was talking to a friend with a serious hangover. Honestly, it was something like that. 

"Like shit," he laughed. "Well, in comparison to before? Much better. But overall? Shit."

"You're alive at least," Keith said, his voice more fragile and small, but still trying to keep its casual air to it. 

_I need you, Lance._

The memories hit him like a wrecking ball. That moment. He remembered it vividly. Incredibly vividly. His pain, his emotions, his desperation. And along with all of that, he remembered the words that Keith had said. 

_Together._

"Yeah, I am." Lance's voice trailed off.

It felt like it was a dream. Like it didn't happen. Keith said that he needed him, that he counted on him. Dare he say, that the man actually cared for him. The warmth of his cheek against his own palm, Lance could still feel it. It was so surreal.

"How did we get out?" Lance asked, clearing his throat.

"Matt. He dropped down a rope and we pulled you up with that," Keith explained. "He would have helped us earlier, but the Galra sent people to finish us off, so he had to deal with that."

"Oh," was all Lance could say. 

They didn't look at each other. Lance staring at the blank TV in front of him, and Keith staring at a fingerprint smudge on the glass coffee table.

"Are you okay?" Keith spoke.

"You already asked me that," Lance responded.

"I asked how you were feeling, not if you were okay."

"They're not the same thing?"

"No," Keith replied, his tone neutral.

Lance looked over at him, watching his face. Keith didn't meet his eyes, keeping them trained downwards on his folded hands that lay in his lap. A couple of seconds passed and Lance turned away again.

"I'm okay." His words sounded forced, so he spoke again, more confidently this time. "I'm okay now."

"Okay." Keith nodded. Lance noticed that he had started twiddling his thumbs together, as he looked off into space.

They stayed like that for a while. Just sitting next to each other in a silence that wasn't necessarily awkward, but definitely wasn't comfortable either. Both of them wondering the same thing, _'_ _What do we do now?_  '

Lance thought that there was always this unspoken animosity between the two of them, which is why he claimed that Keith was his rival. But the beauty of the relationship was in the description itself. It was unspoken. So, hearing Keith's hateful words in that elevator was like a punch to the gut. A slap to the face. A splash of cold, hard reality. The only good thing about that, was the fact that he knew it was coming, so he could partially prepare.

But when Keith whispered those words to him, looked at him that way, it was so much worse than all of the things he compared before. It was a shot through the heart, dead center and clean. He was caught totally unprepared. Keith tore off his armour and shoved a knife straight through his chest with that one sentence. Those four words had him spiraling down a large gaping pit that he barely knew even existed. He was falling, and boy, was he falling  _hard._

And he loved every second of it.

Keith was the first to speak up. "I need to change your bandages now."

"Okay." 

Keith stood up and walked over to the kitchen, grabbing some gauze pads from off the counter, going back to sit next to him again. Lance turned so his back was facing Keith, and he began to get to work. Lance felt his warm fingers grace his back carefully, peeling off the old bandages. Keith tossed them on the coffee table, Lance watching them precariously teeter when they landed close to the edge. It felt weird to feel that part of his lower back exposed to open air again. Keith pressed the gauze pads to his wound and Lance flinched.

"Sorry," he murmured. He taped the pads down with some adhesive tape and tapped Lance's shoulder, signalling he was done. 

Lance shifted to face Keith again, his movements slower and more careful than usual. Their eyes met for a moment, and Keith averted his gaze towards the used bandages on the table. Lance watched him reach over and toss it into a garbage can that was a couple of feet away from the couch they sat on. Silence overtook the room. 

He wanted to say something, say anything, but he didn't know what it was supposed to be. How do you address to your previous rival that he is the reason that you're alive? Well, he guessed that it should start with a 'thank you' first.

Lance looked up at him at the same time that Keith looked up as well, their mouths moving in unison.

"Hey, man-."

"Listen, I-," They said, simultaneously. Lance blinked, and Keith looked confused. Lance gestured towards him.

"You go first-."

"After you-," They said together again. Lance shook his head

"Stop reading my mind, Kogane," he said, chuckling.

"You're the one who keep interrupting," Keith retorted, but there was no malice to his tone. 

"Well, sorry then, you go." Lance offered. 

"No, you first."

"God damn it!" Lance sighed, throwing his arms up in the air, which was a mistake. His arms went up and the wound on his back screamed. He stopped mid-throwing hands up and slowly retracted them back, a pained expression on his face.

"Okay, fine." Keith conceded, biting his lip. He took in a deep breath. "I was going to say thank you."

That was a surprise. "For what?"

"For saving my life from that explosion." Keith exhaled slowly. "You were trying to warn me, but I wouldn't listen, and now you are hurt because of... it."

 _Because of me_.

Lance had completely forgotten about that. It was funny, because that second explosion was the main reason he was hurt and why they were in such danger earlier. And he just forgot about it. 

"Oh, right," Lance said. "You're welcome, then."

A beat of silence.

"I wanted to thank you, too."

Keith looked just as surprised as him when he said the same thing. "Why?"

"...You got me out of there, so thank you."

_You gave me a reason to keep living._

"It's no problem." Keith nodded.

"So, I guess we're even then?"

"I guess we are."

It felt good to hear that from him. It felt good to say that to him. For once, he felt good, despite the physical pain he was in. But there was still one thing on his mind...

"I don't hate you, Lance," Keith suddenly said. He was facing him, a sincere expression on his face.

That was it, Keith was a mind reader. "Wh-...What?" Lance stuttered in confusion. 

"I don't. I know I made it seem like that in the elevator, but it was all a misunderstanding," Keith explained, meeting his eyes with full confidence.

Lance was so confused. "But you literally said that you wouldn't care if I died."

"No,  _you_ said that." Keith stressed, twiddling his thumbs together . "I asked what you would say if that were true, and then you didn't give me a chance to respond."

Oh. Shit, he was right. 

"Oh."

"Plus, if that were true, then I would have just left you to die." he said. "And I can't do that."

"Why?" Lance asked.

"Because...!" Keith let out a distraught huff and trailed off. He ran a hand through his hair. "It would be hard for me to complete the mission by myself."

_I can't do this without you._

Keith's eyes drifted down and he face forward again. Lance studied his face. He knew that that wasn't what he wanted to say.

"Don't worry Kogane, I'm hard to kill," Lance chuckled. He lost count of the number of times he had come close to death.

"Then why were you willing to die-..." Keith cut himself off and hesitated. "-in that moment."

_Why were you wiling to die for me?_

Lance pursed his lips together. He never liked talking about things like this. Talking about his past, his motives, his reasons. It always caused him to spiral, but he figured he should tell it to  _someone_ at least. Maybe it will relieve some of his pain, to tell someone the truth.

"It's what I was trained to do," he said quietly. 

Keith said nothing, so Lance continued.

"I was trained to die and to make sacrifices."

He willed the images in his head away before they became too much for him. But thinking about it once was already too much for him.

"Have you heard about that small mission in Iraq a long time ago?" Lance asked, emptily.

"The one against where the team got overwhelmed, then captured? Yeah, I have." Keith said, scratching the back of his neck. "I heard they all died before they could get tortured for information."

Lance nodded gravely. "Yeah, they did. That was me. I executed them."

Keith went completely silent. Which was completely understandable. I mean, what were you supposed to say when someone reveals that they were forced to shoot their friends in the head, so they wouldn't have to get horribly tortured.

"I..." Keith trailed off. "I didn't know that."

Lance shrugged. "Sacrificing for the sake of everyone else is something I've experienced first hand. That's why."

Keith didn't respond after that for a while, and Lance feared that he had scared him away with his angsty past. When he finally opened his mouth to speak, a small wave of relief washed over Lance.

"I never went on missions with other people. I was always alone, going solo, relying on myself." Keith explained. "Failure was not an option for me, because failure meant death."

Lance nodded slowly. He didn't know that. His past actions and words began to make alot of sense now.

"I barely even had any friends, only Shiro, but that doesn't count since he's basically family." Keith said. Lance didn't really know much about Keith and Shiro's relationship, only that they were very close. 

"And I'm not really good at opening up to people, or even communicating with people in general. Especially ever since Shiro's-," Keith stopped, wincing. Lance knew what he was going to say.

_Ever since Shiro's capture._

Keith cleared his throat, continuing."So, excuse me if I say something offensive or mean, I don't really know what I'm doing. Most of the time it's unintentional. Unless you're pissing me off, then it's intentional," he said, nudging Lance's good side lightly. Lance pretended to sway from the jab and chuckled.

"You don't need to make excuses, dude. I understand," Lance reassured. 

"I just don't want you dying because of something I said."

"Alright, alright, I get it."

"I'm serious, McClain."

"You always are." 

 Keith shook his head, a small smile on his lips. 

"Okay, now go fetch me some fancy Japanese food that I haven't heard of before. I'm sad and crippled, therefore you have to do it," Lance threw his head back in a dramatic fashion, damsel in distress style.

Keith's smile melted off his face and turned into a small pout. He rolled his eyes. "Fine, whatever, but just this once." He pushed himself off of the couch and grabbed his jacket.

"Take good care of me!" Lance called to Keith when he was at the door.

"I will."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hoo boy, love me some dialogue heavy chapters. this was alot of fun to write omg. don't you love it when people communicate their thoughts with each other, instead of leaving things unsaid. also, we have some backstory, oh my! you've all asked for it, and here we finally have some! coming from the mouths of the characters themselves! wowie!
> 
> aaaand we are back to the usual updating schedule yay! there have been a surge of new readers recently too, and im so thankful for that. so welcome, newcomers, to the worst spy au fanfic ever. *reminder* that i post every 7-9 days (every week-ish), and typically post an update on when it's coming out on tumblr under the tag 'ytfm'
> 
> follow me on [tumblr](http://arisushanti.tumblr.com/) for updates on chapters and [instagram](https://www.instagram.com/arisushxnti/) !
> 
> i made an inspo playlist based off this fic, you can listen to it on spotify [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/omgitsreynaa/playlist/4VUPrPU9xlMItnQUQCNF0F?si=qyDRQd9jTXOY-WpPiZBAhQ)
> 
> edit: JOIN MY YTFM DISCORD SERVER THAT I CREATED [HERE](https://discord.gg/pSxctbn)


	16. Into The Fray

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the boys receive a slightly different mission than they were expecting (and decide to have some fun)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i've been watching a crap ton of critical role recently and have been inspired my matt mercer's way of describing settings and NPC's

Sure, it was nice to have a couple of days to relax and kick back, but Lance couldn't help but feel totally useless.

It had been three days since the basement explosion incident where he got severely injured, and during that time he was forced to rest so he could heal. Meanwhile, Keith was assigned to scope out the rest of the possible weapon locations and make sure that Lance was staying put. It was honestly a bit embarrassing. He hated getting babysat by Keith, but it wasn't like he could do much anyway, so he conceded. 

Although, he was really thankful that the agency's medical equipment was so advanced, or else he probably would have been taken off the mission for his injuries. Long before he even became an agent, Coran had invented a healing pod that you could sleep in and it would speed up the healing processes in your body. Lance didn't really know how it worked, or how Coran managed to possibly figure it out, but all he knew was that it worked like magic. Recently, him and Pidge developed a portable version of the healing pod to take on missions. The look of it reminded Lance of those nail polish dryers at salons that you would put your hands under.

So currently, while Keith was off doing God knows what, he was sat on the couch, leg propped up on the coffee table with the healing port around his calf, watching Brooklyn Nine Nine. For only three days, his wounds have made tremendous progress, he guessed that by tonight he would be able to go out in the field again. His back had almost completely healed, save for the gnarly scar that was left behind and the minor soreness whenever he moved around alot. His leg was the last thing that needed work, and judging by the lack of excruciating pain, he was close to being ready. 

A faint beep came from the device on his leg, a small green light flashing on top of it that caught his attention. Carefully, Lance reached down and pressed a button on the side, turning it off. He slowly removed his leg from the inside of it and inspected his calf, running his fingers along the spot where the gash used to be. There was a bumpy scar that stretched out over his skin, but other than that it was completely sealed shut.

He instantly popped up onto his feet, testing out the pain. After a few experimental pushes on his leg, shifting his weight over to the bad side and feeling only a slight soreness, he deemed himself healed. 

"Fucking finally!" Lance sighed in relief, walking around the room as a test run. God, it felt so good to... not be in pain.

Just for fun, he started doing a little dance around the hotel room, shuffling his feet and snapping his fingers when he felt like it. Right on cue, the door beeped behind him and opened up. 

Instinctually, Lance whipped around, hand already going towards the gun holster he had on his pants. He may have been injured, but that didn't mean he would leave himself defenseless. To his relief, Keith walked through the door, dufflebag on his shoulder and a frown on his face. He kicked his shoes off, completely ignoring Lance's healthy and surprised state and fell onto the couch, throwing the dufflebag in the closet before he did.

"Anything?" Lance asked, looking down at his grumpy form.

Keith huffed, crossing his legs. "Nothing! God, we've been wasting our time for three whole days!"

"Well, it wasn't a total waste, I'm able to do shit now!" Lance said happily, and for emphasis he did a little Irish click of his heels. Keith turned to him, finally realizing that he was standing and he looked very curiously at him.

"I can see that," he commented, looking Lance up and down. After a lingering look at his feet, he cleared his throat. "I need to call in with Allura, you should join."

Lance shrugged and nodded, taking his seat on the couch again and grabbing the remote to turn the TV off. Keith went into their bedroom and came out shortly after with his agency issued laptop in his hands. You would imagine that he would leave the thing scarce of any decorations, but he actually had a couple of stickers on the lid of the computer. They were all references to some book series that he had never read before, but he still did find it slightly endearing. 

Keith sat down next to him and opened the computer up on his lap. After a couple of clicks, a familiar outgoing ringtone came in, Keith setting down the computer on the coffee table. Allura answered the call almost immediately, her face adorning a giant grin.

"I was expecting your call, glad to see you are both safe!" she smiled, pearly white teeth glimmering, even through the computer screen Lance could see it. 

"It's not like I was in any danger." Lance shrugged with a little huff of a laugh. 

"Speaking of, how are your injuries?" she asked, eyebrows knitting together in concern. Her smile faltered into a small frown. 

Lance chuckled and grabbed his leg with both hands, lifting it up so it was in frame. "Good as new!"

Keith lightly slapped his arm with the back of his hand and Lance slowly retracted his leg down again, a sheepish smile on his face. Allura laughed, it was genuine sounding, like she was thankful that he was okay again.

"Wonderful to see!" she clapped her hands together. A single strand of her pale hair falls out of her loose bun, and she tucks it behind her ear absentmindedly. "Any progress, Red?"

"Negative." Keith shook his head, a deep frown on his face. "I swept the area and searched for any lower levels, there was nothing."

Allura hummed. "That's quite unfortunate. No matter, I have a slightly different task for you two to focus on today." Both Keith and Lance tilted their head to the side curiously.

"I'm itching for some field work, lay it on us." Lance rubbed his hands together in anticipation. There was still that small inkling of fear in the back of his mind of him getting injured again, but there was no point in worrying about the inevitable.

"Well, you two know about that drug issue with the Galra." Allura started off.

"Quintessence, yes." Keith nodded, crossing his arms over his chest in his usual position. 

"That is correct. Now, thanks to Matt, we have found a bio-technologist that has connections with members of both the Dragons and the Galra." She reached off camera to grab something, and came back holding a literal hologram picture of a man. The white gloves she wore on her hands illuminated a blue light where it came in contact with the holograph. Lance never understood how it worked, and was quite sure that he both never will, and never will want to. Something to do with the special desks having special projectors on it, and more technical stuff like that.

Lance squinted at the slightly translucent picture of their target. For someone with such a technical sounding job, he looked quite attractive in a rough and older type way. The picture was captured as he was walking through the streets, and he had a Starbucks cup in his hand. He was dressed in a suit, dark black hair slicked back into a mafia looking style, with plain black glasses on his face. He looked around forty years old, about 180cm tall, roughly 80kg, Lance managed to pick up just by looking at the picture. 

"This is Asai Akihiro, 43 years old, 183cm tall, weighing 78kg. He is your target." Allura said. Keith perked up when she said the word 'target', and Allura took notice of it, chuckling. "You are not killing him."

"Then what else are we supposed to do with him?" Keith huffed a piece of his bangs out of his eye in annoyance, as if killing him was the only obvious option that they had.

"We're going to get information from him, yeah?" Lance inquired. Allura nodded, waving her hand through the hologram, it disappearing into thin air.

"That is right. He frequents a gambling hall in the same district as the Ivory Club, and you are going to get information about quintessence. Specifically, who was involved in the creation of it and what other purposes it serves."

"Other purposes?" Keith asked. 

Allura typed a couple of things into the keyboard in front of her and another hologram popped up, perfectly framing the camera. It was a picture of the chemical formula and details about quintessence. Most of the words and symbols were beyond him. "Pidge analyzed the samples you sent in a few days ago, and she noted on the fact that some of the side effects were... strange."

She hesitated on the last word, and Lance squinted at her through the camera. "Elaborate?"

"She said that those who took the drug would most likely be likely to fall prey to influences."

"Do you mean they would get addicted and that sort of thing?" Keith asked, confused on the way she worded it.

"No, they would be susceptible to suggestion." 

"Suggestion? Like telling them to do a handstand and they'd do it?" Lance offered. Allura nodded.

"Exactly like that. Pidge isn't sure why they would need that in particular, so I want you two to investigate further on that." Allura said, then lowered her voice to a dark tone. "I feel like the creation of this drug is linked to the super weapons that are being made."

"We're on it." Keith cracked his knuckles, already standing up. Allura raised a hand for him to pause.

"Well, there is one more thing I feel like I need to add," she added with a small nervous chuckle at the end. "He seems to lean towards young men of Latin descent."

Upon hearing her words, Lance's excitement dropped to irritation. She had to be kidding. "So basically, he has a thing for Latinos."

"Yes." Allura gave him an apologetic smile and a small shrug.

Lance sighed while Keith attempted to repress a snort from the side. He whipped towards him, frown on his face. "What's so funny, Mullet?"

"Nothing, nothing." he deflected, waving his hand in dismissal.

Allura clapped her hands together to get their attention. "In any case, you two need to extract information from him, _by any means necessary._ "

"Man, don't say it like that!" Lance pouted, his forehead creasing. Sure, he loved a good ol' seduction mission, but this guy was practically two decades older than he was, and that was pretty gross. And to make it even more disgusting, the man liked  _young_ guys. God, what a pervert.

Allura let out a laugh. "I will be sending you two the location and the usual time he is there. Meanwhile, the both of you can do as you please before then."

Keith and Lance nodded and said simultaneously. "Understood."

"Perfect. I want an update as soon as you return, no matter the time." Allura said, sternly. Normally, Lance would be protesting and saying that she would most likely be asleep, but knowing her sleep schedule, it didn't matter anyways. 

They nodded with no other comments.

"Okay, looking forward to hearing about your progress! Goodbye!" She waved at the camera with her usual cheery smile, and the call ended. 

Lance let out a sigh and stretched his arms over his head. He was looking forward to a bit of action today, but he'd take anything at this point if it meant he wouldn't be bedridden. Keith closed the lid with a gentle  _'click'._

"Sooooo," Lance said, stretching out the word. "What do you want to do?"

Keith shrugged, leaning back more into the velvet couch. "I was just going to train at this boxing gym I found that has free sparring areas."

"Oh, okay." Lance said. Suddenly, an idea formed in his head, and a wicked grin spilled onto his face. "Hey, Keith."

"What?"

"Let's spar."

Keith turned towards Lance, squinting at him in obvious interest. After a moment, he spoke. "You're on."

"Prepare to have your ass handed to you, Kogane!" Lance laughed, already making his way to grab his clothes he uses for exercising. 

"In your dreams, McClain."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lately ive been really tired and lazy, so sorry if this chapter is kinda ass/short/boring. plus, next chapter is gonna be a fun little filler that i've always wanted to write, so ig yall can look forward to that. for those of you who are looking for fighting and action, dont worry, there will still be plenty of that in the next chapter, and the chapter after that ;)
> 
> anyways, i am now officially going to (attempt to) upload every friday at around 11pm-12am EST! hurray! now y'all don't really need to check the ytfm tag so religiously anymore, since ive been getting complaints about that. (but still follow me on tumblr pls and thanks)
> 
> follow me on [tumblr](http://arisushanti.tumblr.com/) and [instagram](https://www.instagram.com/arisushxnti/)!
> 
> i made an inspo playlist based off this fic, you can listen to it on spotify [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/omgitsreynaa/playlist/4VUPrPU9xlMItnQUQCNF0F?si=qyDRQd9jTXOY-WpPiZBAhQ)
> 
> if you like my writing, consider supporting me by donating to my [ko-fi page](http://ko-fi.com/arisushanti)!
> 
> edit: JOIN MY YTFM DISCORD SERVER THAT I CREATED [HERE](https://discord.gg/pSxctbn)


	17. (16.5) Hit Me Like You Mean It

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> L: 1, K: 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> someone said they liked the sparring scene in chapter two, so i decided i'd bring it back.
> 
> also disclaimer: i know next to nothing about boxing and sparring shit. i mean i took krav maga for like 6 months, but that's it. this is all basically based on like mission impossible/jason bourne fight scenes :)

When he said he wanted some action, he didn't really expect that it was going to be with his own partner. Then again, when has he not fought his own teammates?

The walk to the boxing gym that Keith mentioned took about five minutes, and the whole time he was buzzing with excitement. He hadn't had a good sparring session since before they left for the mission, and that was over a week ago. Sure, he had that run-in in the bathroom with the Galra, but that was different. He had his weapons on him, so it wasn't as challenging. When he fought with Keith though, it was just pure fighting. No using weapons, no using terrain, just fists. Exactly what he needed after three days of nothing. 

Keith had brought a backpack with him that was filled with the essentials. Towels, water bottles, hand wraps. When they entered the gym, the man at the front desk looked up at him and gave a small nod, Keith returning the nod. In the middle of the room behind the desk was a large boxing ring, a fight already taking place in it with several people surrounding the ring to watch.

Keith went to one of the guys near the front of the crowd to talk to him, while Lance strained his neck to watch the fight taking place. Surprisingly, a good portion of the people in the crowd were foreigners. Even the two people in the ring appeared to be foreigners, and Americans at that (if the U.S. flag on one of the guy's shorts wasn't an obvious tell). They both looked incredibly tired, and Lance watched the shorter of the two duck a punch and drop down, sweeping his leg out towards the taller man's feet to knock his opponent over. The crowd let out a mix of cheers and  _ooh's_ in sympathy for the tall man, who got knocked on his ass with a hard and resounding thud. Leaving no time to spare, the shorter man crawled on top of him and pinned him down to the ground, putting in blow after blow to the nose, face, jaw, everywhere. The tall man took four heavy punches to the face before he smacked the ground next to him, conceding with a deep and guttural groan.

The surprisingly size-able crowd around the ring erupted in cheers, whooping and hollering in excitement as the man got off his opponent and helped him up with a strong clasp of his forearm. Despite the bloody and bruised state of both men who just finished, what Lance assumed, was an intense match they both had bright smiles on their face. They gave each other a smack on the back while they laughed (and occasionally coughed) merrily, ducking under the boundary ropes and hopping to the ground. 

A hand clasped his shoulder from the side and Lance flinched, turning so he was face to face with none other than Keith. 

"We're up now," he said, pointing to the man he just spoke to. He was a tall, buff German looking guy and had tattoos covering the entirety of his right arm. When Lance looked over at him, he gave him a subtle nod and smugly gestured to the empty ring. 

"Already? No warm up?" Lance asked, suddenly feeling a little nervous. It wasn't like he hadn't fought in front of people before, he did it all the time back at Altea. In fact, the crowds back there were almost 10x bigger than the one that was right here. Nonetheless, little bits of anxiety crawled up his throat that he had to will down.

"This  _is_ the warm up," Keith replied smoothly and sauntered his way up to the ring. Lance straightened himself up as he felt the eyes of the crowd turn to him, and he confidently pushed through them to climb onto the ring. 

Keith was on the other side, already wrapping his hands with a long red cloth that would serve as gloves. Normally, back at the base they would straight up fight with their bare fists, not really caring about whether or not they broke a knuckle or two. Their healing was so advanced anyways, it would only take a couple of hours for the pain to be gone and for them to be able to fight each other again. 

Lance went into the corner opposite of Keith's and noticed he left hand wraps on the ground for him that were in his signature colour, blue. He grabbed them and made quick work of it, wrapping the cloth around his knuckles a few times then around each finger individually, until most of his hand was supported. Finishing in record time, he tied off both hands and pounded his fists together, looking up to see Keith stretching his arms out and staring intently at him. Feeling cocky, Lance sent a little wink at Keith, who deflected the advance with a practiced and expert eye roll. 

"よしお前ら!この戦い始めようぜ,"the taller man that got thrown down said. He stood just outside the ring on the floor that was about a foot lower than the raised area that Lance was standing in. Next to him was, for Christ's sake, a god damn gong. As dumb as it was, Lance was now extremely tempted to ask Allura to buy a gong for sparring matches back at HQ. 

"Ready when you are," Keith said from across the ring to him, cracking his neck with a blank expression. 

"You better not go easy on me!"

"Trust me, I won't."

Lance stretched his arms out across his chest and reached down to touch his toes, loosening up his legs a little more. He could feel Keith's stare on him, watching every single movement he made. It was slightly off putting, if Lance had to be honest. Finishing up with his pre-fight preparations, he turned towards the man that stood at the gong, a large mallet now in his hand, and gave him a nod. 

" _Ready..."_

The two of them made their way closer to the centre of the circle, closing in on each other. Lance stopped just two feet away from Keith, staring him down with a determined grin on his lips. Keith returned his gaze, his lips quirking up slightly into a small smug smirk of his own. 

_"Set..."_

Keith went into a defensive stance, feet planted firmly in the ground and his arms up in front of his face. His fists were open this time, fingers spread fairly loosely as he held them in to block his head. Lance did the same, mirroring his steady foot placement but keeping his fists tight. 

 _"はじめ!"_ the sound of a loud gong rang out throughout the room. Lance blinked and winced a bit at the loud sound, his hands dropping down the slightest fraction from his face. And with that first mistake made, Keith was already sinking his teeth in.

_SMACK!_

Keith's open hands instantly balled into fists and he had a jab cross already flying at him. Momentarily distracted, Keith's left jab gets him in the jaw. It surprised him more than it did hurt him and out of instinct, Lance opened his hand up to push his second, heavier blow aside while moving his head out of the way. Lance successfully managed to block it and using his position to his advantage, he grabbed Keith's fist with the hand that he used to push it aside and used the other to grab onto his shoulders, pushing him down and kneeing him directly in the gut.

To his disappointment, Keith had moved his free hand in front of his stomach so it took the brunt of the force, but it still managed to connect. Keith let out an 'Oof!' as most of the air was knocked out of his lungs and he doubled over, quickly ducking out of Lance's grasp to regain himself. Lance let him. 

"Nice try, buddy." Lance huffed out with a bit of a laugh. "You can't get free hits in that easily."

"Oh yeah?" Keith's annoyed expression turned into a challenging grin, and with speed unlike any other soldier Lance has ever seen, he advanced. 

Lance barely managed to block his punch, the only reason he did was because of the hours and hours he spent fighting with the man himself. Keith stepped in and made a wide swing to the right side of his face. Lance brought his right arm up and intercepted the punch, his forearm throbbing with pain as Keith's fist made contact. Just as quickly as the first, Keith's cross punch came flying in towards Lance's widened eyes. He moved his head to the side just in time, feeling Keith's fists graze the side of his head. 

He couldn't believe how he was currently able to dodge most of Keith's hits. But of course, as soon as he thought that, he was doomed. 

Keith made a show of winding up his next punch and going in straight for Lance's eye. Lance brought both arms up in front of his face to block, but at the last second Keith dropped down to a crouch, sweeping Lance's legs right out from underneath him. 

He hit the ground with a hard thud, his head smacking against the lightly padded floor. It may not have been concrete floor, but it still hurt like a bitch. Lance let out a groan, the inside of his head pounding like hell. That was definitely going to leave a bump. Keith stood over him, staring down with a look of pure smugness across his face.

"立ち上がれ, このやろう!" one of the men in the crowd yelled at him. He had no idea what he was saying, but Lance was pretty sure it wasn't a compliment.

He got to his feet quickly, going back into a fighting stance, facing Keith with a glare. He sure as hell wasn't going to let Keith knock him down like that without getting revenge. 

They circled each other. Both waiting for the other to make the first move. Lance's eyes were locked onto Keith's and they had a mini stare down, seeing who would break first. Lance narrowed his eyes and balled his fists tighter. Keith finally blinked. Lance was going in. 

The second that Keith conceded in their staring contest, Lance was on him. He aimed a jab anywhere at his face, Keith dodging out of the way. Distracting him with the first jab, Lance stepped forward into a cross, using his movement forward as momentum to add power into it. Keith brought his left arm to block it, while his right elbow came flying at Lance's face. He ducked under it smoothly, and used his new position to send a hook straight into his ribs. This time, the blow connected and Keith hissed out in pain, doubling over slightly. 

Not wasting his new lead, Lance popped back up again and winded another wide hook towards the side of his face. As it came in, Keith's hand shot up, blocking it and grabbing onto his forearm. Suddenly, an elbow was smashing into his face. 

With each blow that landed, the crowd around them grew rowdier and rowdier. Lance escaped from Keith's grasp and stumbled backwards, his back hitting the rope boundaries behind him. Keith started moving towards him to grapple him down, and Lance took the chance to do a roundhouse kick into his ribs to push him back. His heel was about to strike directly into Keith's side, but suddenly he was hitting nothing. Instinctively, Keith moved over to the side to dodge it and slipped his arm under Lance's kicking leg, his other arm grabbing onto Lance's shirt sleeve to essentially catch his leg.

And without any warning, Keith tumbled to the ground with Lance's leg still in his grip, taking him down with him. For the second time that fight, the breath was knocked out of him as he was brought down hard. Opening his eyes, Keith was already sitting on top of his waist, fist in the air and coming down fast. Lance quickly jerked his head to the side, causing Keith to miss and punch the ground next to his face. 

Lance's hands darted out, holding the arm that just tried to punch him and the other pushing a palm up into Keith's face. Swinging his legs over Keith's waist for momentum, he pushed up into Keith's face and pulled his arm down, having him fall to his side prone. Lance assumed Keith's earlier position of straddling his waist and punched him directly in the face. 

This time, Keith was too surprised to dodge or block and took the hit. A surge of accomplishment and excitement went through Lance. He surprised him, his wide eyes said it all. He got out of a ground hold, switched the positions on Keith, and fucking punched him in the face. 

The crowd roared, and Lance wound up to punch again. And to his own surprise, Keith reached up, grabbed the sides of his face and leaned in.

Keith looked up at him, evident pain across his face as he cupped both sides of his face. A wave of panic washed over him. Wait what? What was he going to do? Lance was too shocked and confused to move, not wanting to in case he scared Keith off. What was he doing? Why wasn't he retaliating and punching him? His fist began to drop down slowly and Lance began to unintentionally close his eyes...

And then they connected.

Keith brought his face up, leaned back, and fucking head-butted him right in the skull. 

Lance's eyes flew open and he yelled out in surprise and pain, recoiling away from him. Keith took this as an opening and kicked Lance in the chest, sending him stumbling backwards. Lance managed to stay on his feet, but he was put incredibly off balance and Keith was not letting it go to waste. 

Out of instinct, Lance held his arms in front of his face as a protective shield just in time to block Keith's strong punch. Just the impact of it caused him to stumble more, planting his foot behind himself to stabilize. 

As Lance got on the defensive side, Keith went offensive. Punch after punch came towards him, and he tried to dodge them to the best of his abilities. It was fucking difficult. Keith uppercutted him in the chin hard, almost making him bite his own tongue off. A jab to the ribs had him backing up all the way, practically in the corner again. He gripped his side painfully and winced. Keith hit hard, and he was definitely not going easy on him. 

With a face that was stone cold, Keith moved towards him quickly, probably about to grab his head and bash it into his knee. And through Lance's pained haze while recalling the move that Keith has done on him countless times before, he ducked under his arms, grabbed his elbow and wrapped his other arm around his back, took a step back, and fucking threw him to the ground.

The crowd went insane. They erupted in a chorus of cheers and surprised gasps, as Lance judo threw Keith to the ground. Even Keith was surprised, as he hit the ground with a heavy thud. Lance kept a tight hold onto the arm he used to throw him down with, pulling it back and pressing his foot into his shoulder to restrict any movement. 

Keith struggled for a while, wriggling around to try and break free, but every time he'd move Lance would step down harder into his shoulder. He drew in a heavy sigh, ceasing his struggle and with extreme reluctance, tapped the ground to concede. Lance let go of his arm and he retracted it back, rubbing his wrist. 

"Ow," he murmured quietly to himself rolling his shoulder. 

Holy shit, he did it. He finally beat Keith. And boy, was he tired as fuck. At least he knew that he could fight still, despite just recovering.

Lance looked down at Keith on the ground, extending his arm to him. "Need a hand,  _cheri?"_ he teased. Keith glared up at him, but it held no malice and he took his hand gratefully.

Lance pulled him up and they stood face to face now, clutching each other's hand. Keith was looking at him curiously, brows furrowed together.

"Where did you learn that?" he asked, frowning. Or maybe it was wincing, the two expressions looked pretty similar to Lance on Keith's face. 

"By the fifth time I had to sleep with an ice pack on my ass from that move, it was enough time for me to learn it from you," Lance chuckled. Keith rolled his eyes and let out a huff of a laugh. Judging by his suddenly content expression, he was probably thinking about all the times he dropped Lance on his ass too. Keith shook his head after a moment.

"Well, let's get going, I think we spent enough time here." he said, making his way to the edge of the ring to duck under the rope and hop off the raised platform. Lance followed him as he walked through the crowd. Several people actually went and smacked him and Keith on the back, a chorus of congratulations being said. Most of them were in Japanese so they went over his head, but he got the general gist of it. 

"Hey, where are you two going?" a voice behind them called, causing the two of them to turn around. It was the taller man who had been fighting previously. 

"We need to get going!" Lance called over his shoulder, looking back and forth between him and Keith, who had his hand on the door and was currently waiting.

"Are you not staying longer? I wanted to get a piece of you, skinny man!" he chuckled deeply, cracking his knuckles together in anticipation. Lance frowned and opened his mouth to respond, but Keith cut him off.

"We have other people to pay a visit to," he said as he pushed the door open, walking out, but not before calling over his shoulder. "You wouldn't stand a chance against him anyways!"

Lance blinked in surprise at his response, but before he could get anything in, he was getting tugged out the door and out onto the streets again. Keith let go of his arm, turning around on his heel to walk back towards the hotel, leaving a partially stunned Lance behind him. He quickly caught up, keeping pace beside Keith's purposeful strides.

"Let's go, I think that was enough of a warm up for you." he mumbled out, chewing his lip in thought.

"What's wrong, mullet? Mad that I beat you?" Lance nudged his shoulder.

Keith rolled his eyes. "No, I just don't know if we should have done that."

Lance tilted his head to the side, "Done what? Sparring? I'm fully healed man, you don't have to worry about that."

He shook his head, dismissing the thought. "Nevermind, forget it. I'm sure it will be fine. Anyways, you better be prepared."

"That's ominous."

"For tonight, McClain." Keith gave him a pointed look.

Lance drew a blank, his thoughts still muddled and racing from the fight. "What?"

"Our mission. You need to extract information about quintessence from that Akihiro guy. The one that likes-"

"-latino guys, I remember." Lance cut him off with a sigh. He almost forgot about that part, being too busy getting his ass kicked and kicking ass earlier. A disgusted shiver went down his spine and Keith cleared his throat beside him, an obvious cover up for a laugh. Lance shot a glare towards him.

"Shut up."

"I didn't say anything."

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (sorry for the lame ass ending to this chapter, i just wanted to finish it so i can get to the good shit)
> 
> HEY, IM BACK! I am so sorry to all of you guys for that super long hiatus, I apologize if I let you down for that. As a little mini explanation: school started, got busy and unmotivated to continue, got sad, but then got happier again and felt like i should return! so, here I am! back! hopefully I can continue to stay consistent after this, but I am not promising that it will be as frequent of uploads as before. probably every other week or so.
> 
> and since I didn't get to address this before properly..... WE GOT OVER 10K HITS! WE'RE AT LIKE 12K I THINK! WOWIE! thank you all so so so muchhhhhh. It has been my ultimate goal to reach over 10,000 hits, and I did! we did! i am so happy! thank you to all the OG ytfm stans (you know who you are), could not have made it without you.
> 
> anyways, i would like to give a big shoutout to airahoshiyomi on tumblr for helping me out with the japanese translations! and as well to leave1themathtopidge on tumblr for creating some AMAZING fanart for the sparring scene from chapter two, which inspired me to (in a way) re-write/write a rematch for it. you can view the amazing piece of work [here](https://leave1themathtopidge.tumblr.com/post/177419361289/sparring-inspired-by-a-fanfiction-called-your)
> 
> follow me on [tumblr](http://arisushanti.tumblr.com/) and [instagram](https://www.instagram.com/arisushxnti/)! (i'm more active on tumblr, so if you want to make fun of me, do it there)
> 
> i made an inspo playlist based off this fic, you can listen to it on spotify [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/omgitsreynaa/playlist/4VUPrPU9xlMItnQUQCNF0F?si=qyDRQd9jTXOY-WpPiZBAhQ)
> 
> edit: JOIN MY YTFM DISCORD SERVER THAT I CREATED [HERE](https://discord.gg/pSxctbn)


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